S. O. S - · PDF fileWe thrilled at the narrative of Chateau-Thierry and St. Mihiel, yet every twenty-four hours Since we have had an army o f any size in France these legions

GENERAL ! OHN ! . PERSHING

Commander-in-Chief of the A . E . F.

ISAAC F. MARCOSSONAUTHOR OF

THE BUSINES S OF WAR ,

THE REBIRTH or RUS SIA ,

THE WAR AFTER THE WAR ,

ETC.

FOREWORD

HIS book was written in France— O ften withinsound o f the guns— as a tribute to the unsungheroes O f Supply and Transport . Many were

above mi l itary age ; most O f them le ft congenial jobsto do thei r part in a task which was both stern andunspectacular. Far from the firing line which theylonged to j oin

,and amid the dust o f traffic , the din

of docks,and the hot confines of an Office , they con

tributed v ital ly to the achievement of the AmericanExpeditionary Force .Their work discloses an unselfish and uncomplaining eff ort that will rank with the glories O f ChateauThierry

,St . Mihiel and Sedan . More than this i t

proves that the genius O f American organisation wasno less effective in war than in peace . The lessons ofefficiency learned under the stress o f necessity overseas should now be capitalised in the vast Drama O f

Reconstruction at home.TO those gallant men O f the A .E.F. from the Com

mander-in-Chie'

f down , I desire to express my grateful appreciation o f a co-operation and a comradeshipthat made my work a pleasure and a privilege.

I . F. M .

New York,January, 19 19.

CONTENTS

PAGE

THE B IRTH OF THE S . O . S .

THE BUSINESS OEWAR

ARM ! TRACKS AND TRAPPIC

FROM SHIP TO SHORE

FEEDING THE DOUGHBO ! S

THE CITIES OF SUPPL!

DETROIT IN FRANCE

THE MIRACLE MOTOR MAN

THE SALVAGE OF BATTLE

NEW MEN FOR OLD

THE MARVELS OF ARM ! ORGANISATION

S ! STEM UNTO DEATH

BUSINESS MANAGING WAR

THE BALANCE SHEET

ILL US TRA/TIONS

GENERAL ! OHN ! . PERSI—IING

THE AUTHOR’S LETTER OF AUTHORI ! ATION

MA! OR-GENERAL ! AM ES G . HARBORD

BRIGADIER-GENERAL HAGOOD AND THE AUTHOR

BRIGADIER-GENERAL W . W . ATTERBUR !

MA! OR-GENERAL HARR ! L. ROGERS

COLONEL F. H. POPE

COLONEL H. A . HEGEM AN

LIEUTENANT-COLONEL M . R . WAINER

COLONEL H. C . SM ITHER

BRIGADIER-GENERAL EDGAR ! ADW IN

BRIGADIER-GENERAL M . L. WALKER

COLONEL W . ! . WILGUS

BRIGADIER-GENERAL GEORGE VAN HORN MOSELE !

BRIGADIER-GENERAL CHARLES G . DAWES

1 76

1 76

1 76

1 76

288

288

288

288

3 1 0

FrontispieceFACING

PAGE

28

46

52

82

I— The Birth of the S . O . S .

HE boom O f American cannon echoed beyond

the Meuse ; machine guns sputtered wickedly

to the right and le ft ; overhead Liberty motors

hummed as the aeroplanes returned from thei r evening reconnaissance ; down the dark paths to the

trenches troops marched to the rattle o f equipment .All around was the deadly din O f war —the unfai ling

music of the supreme world drama. America wason the frontiers o f the Great Redemption .

Behind that fighting front stretches another bat

t le-l ine that reaches from those peri lous posts O f free

dom f p ur hundred mi les down to the sea and then

three‘

thousand miles beyond to the shores O f the

United States . About i t i s no glamour o f sti rring

spectacle ; no scene of actual combat. Yet day and

n ight and with ceaseless and heroic endeavour it feeds

and supplies the battling hosts . Instead of mustard

gas it breathes the choking dust Of teeming highways ;in place O f open Shot and bursting shell i t faces the

hidden hazard of the submarine. Bending beneath

the burden of a tonnage that i s one of the wondersof the war, i t maintains the in surance against a dis

aster more destructive than Hun advance. For mouth

and guns must be fed and fighters clothed and carried .

We thri lled at the narrative of Chateau-Thierry

and St . Mihiel, yet every twenty-four hours S ince wehave had an army o f any size in France these legions

Of transport and subsistence , combating wind, rain

and every Obstacle that war-fare in a foreign landimposes

,have regi stered an achi evement fit to rank

with that high heroism . Their gallantries have been

recorded in the tangle O f railroad yards, in the gloom

of warehouses, amid the glare of sun-scorched quays,or the prosaic routine O f repai r shops . For them

there are f ew medals O f merit ; only the consciousnessthat without thei r unsung servi ce of the rear there

would be no brill iant Offensive at the front.This army behind the army is the first to land ; the

last to leave . In hi s eager search for the smell of

powder S ightseer and historian pass it by. Nor isit surprising. In the thral l o f battle tumult the world

loses Sight of the mechanics of war. It i s easier to

have an emotion about a forlorn hop e led to victorythan about a food supply column that reached the

line under a storm of Shrapnel . Yet the courage o f

the teamsters who faced death with only the re ins

in thei r hands i s full mate to the valour Of the fight

ing men armed with rifles .From France this past year has come a flood of

writing about the fighting doughboy and hi s doings.

The boy who supplies the doughboy has, in the main,escaped the Spot-l ight. Yet he i s part O f an intricateorgan i sation that has solved, SO far as supply and

transport are concerned,the most stupendous mili

tary problem in all hi story. For every soldier that

https://www.forgottenbooks.com/join

S . O . S .

wrestle with figures,pore over charts

,pound type

writers, drive trucks, unload ships and build docksand rai lways in order that thei r more fortunate brothers may have a fl ing at glory. This romance o f

Ameri ca transplanted i s as sti rring as any battle biography.

I have touched it at every point . For weeks Ifollowed the trail o f tins and transport from dock

to trench, I l ived in the turmoi l o f ports, dug into

diagrams, saw thi s whole panorama o f supply passin deafen ing and well-nigh bewildering review. When

you have watched it you reali se why the American

soldier has not missed a meal or lacked the where

withal to fight ever since he has been abroad . It

took blood and sweat and agony to produce the good s,but they have always been delivered . The fi fty mil

lions that we spend every day for war are not wasted .

L ikewise you understand how,when Pari s sat im

perilled last July,General Pershing could swing a

well-equipped and well-supplied army into the line

almost overnight and help stem the tide at that hi s

toric stream where once before civi lisation trembledfor its fate . It was not accident or luck that addedChateau-Thierry to the lustre of American arms . I t

was because the American overseas machine that feedsthe fighting man was so well constructed and so mo

bile that it responded swi ftly and efficiently to thefir st emergency call . Here was revealed and in kin

dling fashion the initial phase o f the mighty miracle

that has transformed a disorganised democracy into

a form idable military power.

THE BIRTH OF THE S . O . S . 19

I have no i llusions about army organisation . For

three years I have ranged that flaming batt le l ine thatonce began in the snowy Caucasus and ends at lastin the blue waters o f the Adriatic . In that time Ihave seen many millions o f men under every condi

tion o f modern combat and comm isariat.“The l ives

they led were mine .” Thus it came about in thetroubled course o f war events that a fte r al l thi s wan

dering amid alien armies and under foreign flags I

came at last to my own people to find the supreme

supply achievement o f the struggle .It i s no depreciation of any of the army organisa

tions that I have described to say that the AmericanBusines s of War as expressed in the Service o f Sup

ply ( the“S . O . S .

” they call i t for Short ) i s the mos t

remarkable per formance o f the kind that I have yetseen . Th

'

ose magic letters which,flashed by wireless

,

spell distress at sea, mean first aid to the fighting

American in France . Dwell under thei r Standard and

you feel that they may also stand for the Spiri t ofSacrifice !

Do not get the idea that we have reached pe rfection . You cannot construct a Panama Canal over

night and fai l to find a f ew raw spots at dawn . Weare not standardised , for example, l ike the Briti sh

or the French . But England and France have reachedthe limit of their war strength ; they have been going

war concerns for over four years . Our troops and

supplies, - on the other hand,are in a constant race

across the Atlantic . We serve as we build . Hence

in the magnitude o f our ope rations, in the diflflculties

S . O . S .

that eternally beset us, and in the far-flung and gal

vanio energy that animates us, we stand alone . The

impetuosity of the American soldier, one o f hi s out

standing qualities,obtains with ration as with rifle .

The proverbial desert that suddenly bloomed like

a garden has nothing on the A . E . F . By one of the

curious paradoxes of war we create and consume at

the same time . A warehouse i s filled be fore it is

roo fed ; giant cranes swing cargoes from Ships while

they are being berthed ; the cow-catchers of American

locomotives press on the heels of the track construc

tion gangs . The supply city o f to-day'

is unrecognisa

ble in a fortnight because i t grows so fast. We have

turned farms into factories ; converted swamps into

swarming communities . We reclaim men just as we

salvage guns. We have laid down and operate a seri es

of railways equal in scope to the Pennsylvania sys

tem we feed and supply a population almost as large

as that o f St . Loui s ; we have erected a cold storage

plant that would supply every citizen in Greater

New York , London , Pari s and Chicago with fresh

meat for twenty-four hours ; somewhere in France

we have established a motor principali ty that i s a

small repl ica of Detroit . Co—ordinating thi s universeof eff ort i s a system of control and administration,linked up with every sci entific aid to modern com

merce, that would run a hundred United States Stee l

Corporations all rolled into one . Even the horses

have identity discs ! Quantity output, which drama

tises the genius of the American Industry of Peace,

THE B IRTH OF THE S . O . S . 2 1

i s duplicated in thi s new American Business of War,Unlimited !Every real Ameri can i s a shareholder in thi s giant

enterpri se . Its bank i s the Liberty Bond ; i ts balancesheet the rol l o f our national honour ; i ts perpetual

dividend will be peace and secu ri ty in the days to

come .

The spirit of that Overseas America which changed

All ied depression into defiance in the crucial hour of

the war i s a fter all the same pioneer spiri t that con

quered the prairi es and won the West . It an imated

Lincoln and Lee and Grant and i s to—day reincar

nated in the character and purpose o f Pershing and

the working and fighting host he leads . In thi s warborn fai th which finds one expression in the Servicesof Supply lie s the hope of the New America, which ,re—created in the crucible of confl ict, will be a factorin the rehabi litation of the world .

! ou cannot understand the immense Operation

which daily pumps and provide s the li fe blood o f theA. E . F. without knowing the approach to that his

tori c day when our troops first set foot on France .It explains many things

,most of all the colossal diffi

culties under which our supply system was launched .

As most people know, M arshal Joff re went toAmerica soon after we declared war and pleaded for

immediate assistance . It i s no secret that the Frenchmorale had wavered Sl ightly under three years of

incessant hammering. Human endurance,heroic as

i t was, had almost reached the limit of i t s powers .

The hero of the first battle of the Marne said in

S . O . S .

substance : S end us troops at once. ! ou must make

a beginning no matter how small .” This procedure

was against our better judgment, which dictated delay unti l we could come in force . Besides the wayhad to be prepared . But France’ s need was urgent .

It followed that almost be fore the United States

real ised that it had gone to war our Fi rst Expedi

tionary Force — the immortal prototype of Britain’ s

gallant “First Seven D ivi sions,

” steamed unheralded

into St . Nazai re on a June day in 19 17 that wil l be

forever famous. S O far as the tools of supply and

transport were concerned,that vanguard o f the new

armies o f democracy had practically nothing but its

bare hands,and with these implements it set to work .

The spade had to precede the crusade . Bread was

necessary be fore bullets . The first Scene in the vast

dram a o f our actual participation there fore di scloses

that hand ful o f men in khaki digging, grubbing andbui lding, and it has kept up ever Since on a constantly

increasing scale .At the start the two principal problems were re

vealed . One was labour ; the other was tonnage .

This i s why our l i ttle army could not j oin the battlel ine at once . It discarded the rifle for the pick ; the

engineers who came out to plan trenches , military rail

ways, and fortifications had to enlarge docks, bui ld

berths and erect bakeri es .NOW began the chorus of European criticism which

was not without i ts echoes back home . Those of uswho travelled back and forth f rom Europe in those

trying days got i t on al l sides. “Why i s America

THE BIRTH OF THE S . 0. S . 23

so slow ! Why can’ t a nation of a hundred millionsget an army into the field ! ” was th e re frain .

These people who j eered and cri ticised little knewthe price in sweat and sacrifice that our outpo sts in

France were paying for unreadiness . But i f the nation was unprepared the individual was not. It i s

the triumph o f thi s dauntless individuali sm , now

welded into an organise d and close-knit whole,that

has made the achievement of the A . E . F. possible .Nowhere i s i t more strikingly apparent than in the

development of the Services of Supply.

But while those intrepid outposts whose picks and

derricks regi stered a courage not surpassed on thefiring line, worked and worried , help was on the

way . During the heart-breaking autumn o f 19 17 the

labour battal ions began to arrive . The plantation

darkey from Alabama suddenly found himsel f work

ing alongside a Chinese coolie on a French dock piled

with American supplies. We began to annex ports ;our engineers burrowed into the rich soi l o f France ;acres of machinery sprawled about in apparent con

fusion . Stil l the plaint was “Why so slow ! ”

Then the mi racle happened . Almost overnight the

visible structure of a vast supply system appe ared .

Out o f the mire rose quays ; in the waste places ware

houses broke like magic ; American locomotives seemingly sprang from the ground as the fabled knights ofold leaped from the planted dragons ’ tee th . The

French blinked their eyes ; our Briti sh cousins stood

speechless. But to the American it represented no

witchery or necromancy. Accustomed to se e a gaping

S . O . S .

busy hole in the midst o f a city block give forth asteel Skyscraper almost overnight he knew that Yankee

construction history, animated by stupendous hustle ,was Simply repeating itsel f .In trying to appraise our whole supply and trans

port performance in France ( and it i s all part o f thelarger American war story) , i t i s well to rem embe r

that practically without preparation we were sud

denly called upon to send an army overseas and sus

tain i t . Back of th i s lay the fact that we had to create

and train that army first . Unti l we went to gr ips with

Germany we had no considerable armed force. What

we did have was largely national guard . The regular

e stablishment never exceeded men. It was

scattered throughout the United States, Alaska , PortoRico , the Philippines , China and Panama . A colonel

se ldom had his regiment together ; save at manoeuvres

we never mustered a brigade ; unti l the mobilisation

on the Mex i can border a divi sion was an impossi

bility. The European war produced the General Or

ganisation Project which outlined a real American

army comprising a larger combatant force than the

whole Union had at the close of the Civil War ; manymore men than Grant had ever handled at any one

time. The modern army not on ly fights but invents.

Into its scheme must go every aid that science or

German hellishness have brought to honourable com

bat. It mean s wireless, searchlights, gas and aero

plane serv ice,and countless other things undreamed

of when we went to war with Spain . Yet this scheme

was only on paper when the hour struck for Amer


S . O . S .

or on the sun-baked Mexican border, who formed thenucleus o f the wing of our enormous supply service

that i s the backbone of the system . Then, too ,

Americans did not readi ly grasp the idea that a great armymust be equipped and, what i s most important, properly organ i sed and officered . All this required Edu

cation at a time when intelligent and alert Co-op'

era

tion should have been the watchword . It only made

our j ob in Europe al l the harder.

But thi s moral handicap paled be fore the physical

obstacles that grimly blocked the way. Heading thelist was the super-problem of transporting men andsupplies across three thousand miles of sea , full o f

hidden terror and destruction . With a minimum av

erage requirement of five tons of Shipping for everyman in France the magnitude o f the proposition i s at

once apparent . And we had no shipping .

Right here came the fundamental di fference betweenthe subsistence problems of the three leading Allies .The French had all their sources of supply at hand ;England could recti fy her water transportati on In

twenty-four hours ; with us it was a matter of threeweeks’ time between departure and arrival . Empires

have been won and lost in that time .

Once we arrived in France we found that all uti li ties such as docks, rai lways, and telephone and telegraph lines were being used by others, principally theFrench

,but in many instances by both the French and

the Briti sh . Instantly there came the inevitable and

peace ful confl ict with French laws. I f you have evertri ed to do anything “

Oflicial” in France you can at

THE BIRTH OF THE S . 0. s . 2 7

once appreciate the tangle of red tape and the maze

of complications into which we were plunged .

Then,too

,there was the great difficulty of operat

ing in a foreign country whose language and customswere unknown to the great majority of our men .

Finally we had to expand our l ittle peace organisation into an immense and elasti c overseas expedition

that would take its full part in helping to de feat themightiest o f all mil itary machines that had been forty

years in the making and which was sti l l going strong.

Such was the seemingly impossible task that con

fronted us in Apri l,19 17. To— day the impossible has

been made possible . The American Army that holds

its well-won place in the battle l ine o f freedom ; the

unbroken chain o f supply and transport behind ,stretching from Alsace-Lorraine to San Francisco

,i s

the answer that Yankee resource,energy and patriot

ism have made to the Great Call . How has it beendone !

Come with me to the li ttle French town which

houses the General Headquarters o f the A . E . F. andI wil l Show you both the mainspring and the inspira

tion . In a simple office,in a weather-beaten bui ld

ing that fl ies the American and French flags at its

gate and whose stone walls have echoed with the

swords and spurs of many generations of French sol

diers in the making,s its the erect

,serious

,keen-eyed

man whose broad shoulders bear the chief burdenof responsibility o f our armies abroad . General

Pershing foresaw what would and did happen .

“To

foresee, said the French philosopher,

“i s to rule .”

S . O . S .

In this mi li tary statesmanship l ies our sa fety and our

success in France . It was his grave eyes that beheldthe v i sion of American opportuni ty, and it has had a

rich fulfilment . The Simple reason why we met everyextraordinary and unexpected demand upon us i s thatour facil ities are so elastic as to be capable of almostindefinite expansion.

Had they been rigid— that i s,limited to the esti

mate of our original oversea s force— we , and probably the whole Allied Cause, might have been lost .

As it was they stood the well-nigh incredible strai nin amazing fashion and reveal the Commander-inChie f both as Seer and Soldier.Le t us go back and see just what happened . When

the“C . i n as the head of the army is called , ar

rived in France in June,19 17, the war situation was

apparently satis factory. The British were well estab

lished up the Somme ; everywhere the French heldtheir own * the Italians were pushing confidently on.

An optim ist would have sai d : “All is well .” Theprogramme of our expeditionary force , then set for

men,seemed to be ample for al l needs.

But General Pershing saw beyond the security of

that hopeful hour. Russia had begun to crack and in

the Slav disintegration that followed lay di saster for

us al l. France was bled white ; England was combing

out her man-power ; America was the last, the only,reserve . The final brunt would be hers .

So thi s far-seeing chie ftain looked ahead to the

contingency that might ar ise, not in'

a year but in

two or three . ‘How wise was his foresight was amply

Pl e as e a f f or d him'al l ne ce s s ary M i l i t i a i n th e

FAC-S IM ILE OF THE ORIGINAL ORDER ISSUED AT AM ERICAN GENERALHEADQUARTERS AUTHORI ! ING M R . M ARCOSSON

’

S INVESTIGATION OF

THE S . O . S .

THE B IRTH OF THE S . O . S . 29

proved by subsequent events . In less than twelvemonths from the time o f his advent Italy ’ s reverse hadbeen registered , Russia , prey to anarchy and m is

guided upli ft,had made her obscene peace with the

Kaiser ; the German off ensive had swept the Briti sh

down the Somme once more Pari s was the target o f

attack .

Out of that enci rcling gloom flashed Lloyd George’ sfamous Hurry, hurry

” appeal to America , and it was

not sent in vain . Like those hosts o f the ’Sixties whomarched to Father Abraham “Five hundred thousand

strong,” the Yankee s came sai ling over the sea. Every

schedule was quadrupled ; all original estimates and

plans went by the board . A steady stream of khaki

poured into France. What was more, i t was debarked ,supplied and rushed up the l ine and all be cause the supply and transpo rt machine , conceived in foresight and

builded in wisdom , met the test . It made Chateau

Thierry, Saint Mihiel and all that has followed possible.Those heroe s o f pick and spade and derri ck who

had toi led in port and supply depot had thei r full

hour o f compen sation . They saw the original army

o f swell into a million and then reach far

beyond,and no man went unfed .

The machine which began with bare hands and stouthearts has grown to a giant with l imbs of titanic

strength . It i s not only working for this war but for

generations unborn . In the scope and permanency ofits structure lies the real earnest of our endeavourin France. Its parallel i s the mass of stone and

30 S . O . S .

concrete war buildings rising in Washingt on not

reared for to-day but for the future.Just be fore I started on my investigation of theAmerican arm y I spent the night with old friends

at British General Headquarters in France . We dis

cussed our immense supply preparations which inter

ested them immensely. Suddenly a grizzled General

with a foot of serv i ce r ibbons on the breast of his tunic

said“Your people are working on the theory that the

war i s going on indefinitely. It ’ s amazing.

”

He hit the American nai l on the head, for thi s i s

precisely what we are doing in France. The Domaino f Supply and Transport which we are about to ex

plore i s a vast business institution that, while dedicated

to war,i s bound to have a tremendous Significance

with peace .The tiny acorn which burst forth as the AmericanExpeditionary Forces was planted in an environment

that was in Sharp contrast with the forest of eff ort

that i t has produced to-day. In that precarious June

of last year when General Pershing and his handful

of fellow officers faced the task of creating a systemo f combat and supply overseas, the offices of the expe~

dition were in a modest building in the Rue Constantine in Paris. Almost within the shadow of the stately

and gi lded dome o f the Invalides which shelters the

dust o f the great Napoleon was born the whole organisation which has become a prop o f the war. Here

first of all the General Staff in France was created .

Later, in a back room and at a conference presided


S . O . S .

come five thousand miles from thei r native bush andrange

,but they only carry thei r ini tial supplie s. Eng

land furni shes the rest from her home and other de

pots. Although a considerable portion of the Britisharmy supply i s gathered from different parts o f theworld and is subj ect to the sea menace

,She was not

absolutely dependent upon these foreign sources .

W i th America i t was diff erent . We were up againstthe stagger ing proposition of not only conveying all

our troops over three thousand miles of danger-ridden

sea but likewise carrying the great bulk of our food,equipment and munitions the same way. Our system

o f supply had to be break-down proo f. How to ac

compli sh thi s was the proposition put up to that group

of pioneers o f America abroad who sat around the

table in that dingy back room o f the Rue Constantine .No wonder they thought of the intrepid li ttle soldierwhose dust reposed just across the way and who like

wise had hi s troubles with food and transport many,many miles from home.These men knew that long be fore they could even

dream of j oining the smoke-enveloped battle-l ine of

dem ocracy they must Settle the al l-important question

of a continuous subsi stence supply. Emergencythat un fai ling speeder-up of idea and event— came to

their rescue. At that round t able was devised theremarkable plan known as Automatic Supply which

i s the essence of ourwhole overseas system . Just as

printing is the art preservative o f art, so i s thi s scheme

the means prese rvative of our l ives and our fortunes

THE BIRTH OF THE S . 0. S . 33

To grasp i t fully you must understand the veryobvious fact that in war a reserve of food and sup

plies i s all essential . That ancient and familiar saying

that armies fight on their stomachs i s as true to day

in the era o f machine-gun,poison gas , wireless , aero

planes and tanks as i t was when cave men fought withstone weapons . The strength of the army food re

serve depends upon the distance of the fighting forcefrom its base . With the Briti sh Expeditiona ry Force

the so-called fixed food reserve i s thi rty days. This

means that al l the huge supply depots in France and

England ( I Shal l use the Bri ti sh Expeditionary Force

in France for the contrast ) , a quantity of food , fuel,and forage equal to thi rty days’ consumption by man

and beast i s maintained . No matter what happens

thi s reserve must be kept up . It i s the insurance

against enemy action , break down or delay in transport— any o f the many emergencies that ri se up in warand knock down the best laid plans and incidentallydestroy precious supplies .But England in France, as I have already pointedout, i s only a comparatively short di stance from her

home reserves. A short trip across the Engli sh Chan

nel can recti fy any di slocation in her food communica

tions . What were we to do three thousand m i les fromour home ports and factories !No one could tell then , any more than they can

tel l now , just what the submarine would do. Not be

ing a heedless Optimist General Pershing,together

with his advi sers , took no chances. They assumed the

worst would happen , so they fram ed up the famous

S . O . S .

plan which I have re ferred to as the Automati c Supply. This provides the unfailing and yet flexible

meal ticket of the A . E . F.

By thi s procedure our whole food supply— and for

that matter all munitions and supplies,even a whole

rai lway system from spike to station— renews itselfautomatically, and there fore without the formality of

special requisitions for stores . In the simplest way

this i s the way the system works :For every unit o f troops that goe s to France

—whether they arrive in one convoy or in detached

groups— a four months’ supply of food i s also sent at

the same time from the United States. What amountsto a thi rty days ’ supply goes with the men while a

n inety days’ reserve i s shipped coincidentally. Thisninety days’ reserve becomes the backbone o f our e f

fort . It may not land at the same port as the unitfor which i t i s designated but i t reaches France andbecomes part of the general food reserve. No matterhow many units of men may leave the UnitedStates thi s ninety days’ reserve becomes their t ravel

ling companion,near or distant. It i s on the ocean at

the same time.By making thi s reserve cover ninety days we have

trebled the British quantity and taken into considera

tion what those wise men who framed the systemhad in mind

,namely

,the very worst that the sub

marine could do. The destruction of a whole month’ s

or even two months’ supply could not mean disaster

for us.

This process i s technically known as the Initial Sup

THE B IRTH OF THE S . 0. S . 35

ply. It means that with the Automatic Supply which

I Shall describe in a moment, sufficient food , with theexception of fresh beef and a few minor ration com

ponents, i s constantly kept in France to last our whole

overseas force four months .But troops must eat and at the same time the integrity of thi s ninety days’ reserve must be maintained .

How is i t done ! Here i s where the Automatic Supply comes in. Every month there i s shipped from the

United States sufficient food to feed our overseasforce for thi rty days . It i s in units o f the needs of

men . This might be called the standing ordero f the army and i s for current consumption . It

moves like clock-work every thirty days . It i s pre

cisely as i f a housekeeper had left a permanent order

wi th her grocer to send her on the first day o f everymonth enough flour

,t inned goods, salt , pepper, vege

tables— in fact all her kitchen needs— for thi rty days

and he scrupulously followed instructions . I f he i s

a good grocer She never has to renew the order savewhen her family increases . The Acting Quartermaster

General at Washington , Brigadier-General R . E .

Wood , i s the good grocer ; he never misses a Shipmentto France . For every unit o f 2 men that set footupon France he S imply chalks up another increase to

that immense standing order. Nothing can be sim

pler than thi s system .

All supplies are not,and cannot be automatic . Every

hour of the day and night in France some emergency

leads to unexpected demands . Take Ordnance. Abig push may use up an immense amount of ammuni

S . O . S .

tion and cut into the fixed reserve which i s based on

the dai ly needs of all guns . Take Construction . Theunexpected advent o f troops in certain regions who

need barracks,together with the demand made on

the light and standard gauge rai lway for extensions,may consume material far beyond the widest provi

sion made in advance . A ll thi s must be renewed andat once

,and it i s done through so-called Exceptional

Requisitions, or Demands, as they are called by the

Briti sh . The articles thus obtained are termed Ex

ceptional Supplies, and are only sent in response toa special requisition made on the War Department by

the Supply Service in the field .

Here in brie f i s the crux o f our supply system inFrance . An extraordinary and unprecedented remedy

which has proved to be not only submarine proo f buthas stood up against every tremendous demand made

upon it. With a knowledge o f this bulwark o f the

soldier ’s stomach— the fundamental war precaution

we can now proceed to the story of the complete armyorganisation in France which i s necessary be fore wecan explain the concrete workings of the Services of

Supply.

II— The Business of W ar

F those meetings o f General Pershing and hi s firstcolleagues in the Rue Constantine in Pari s had

only hatched out the Initial and Automatic Sup

ply systems they would have been historic . But they

did much more . In the creation of the General Staff

o f the A . E . F. they laid the foundation o f the whole

close-knit combat,supply

,and transport scheme which

enabled the A . E . F. to assume its full share of theterrific burden of war.

I f you know anything about war you also knowthat everyth ing radiates from the Staff . Individual

initiative i s only possible or eff ective in the emergencyo f battle or with a sudden breakdown in transport .The successful conduct of modern war is the resulto f team-work , co-ordination

,the fitting together of

many units . It i s the product of many closely-attuned minds. The real and unadvertised work of

war there fore i s done behind closed doors . Its secrecy

and si lence are in contrast with the crash and carnageof the tragi c tumult i t produces .Let us take the Ge neral Staff at General Headquar

ters first . Although we have nothing to do with fighting, we must understand i ts functions, because they

are duplicated to a large extent at the Headquarters

37

of the Services o f Supply. This i s as good a placeas any to emphasise the fact that in France we have

two absolutely separate arm ies , with entirely separateand Completely equipped headquarters from a Com

manding General down . One is the General Headquarters presided over by General Pershing

,who i s

the supreme chie f i n France and whose j ob i s fight

ing ; the other i s the Headquarters of the Services of

Supply whose j ob i s to sustain and equip those fighters . Each of these Headquarters has a General Staff

Similar in organisation although the body at GeneralHeadquarters i s senior in authority and creates the

larger policies which the Staff of the S . O . S . inter

prets .

The staff at G . H . Q . has five sections devoted toAdministration

,Intelligence

,Operations (which i s

fighting) , Co-ordination and Training. Originally

these sections were known by these respective activi

ties. Subsequently the designations were changed .

Administration became G I . This is the Wholesalerand gets tonnage and personnel to France and alsopurchases in France . Intelligence , now known as G2 ,

deals with all in formation about the enemy. It has

ram ified functions that range from censorship tocounter-espionage . Operations

,now G3 , employs

troops in the field . Co— ordination,which is G4, han

dles and distributes what G I procures . But i t doesmuch more . It i s the supreme standard iser, one o f

the most remarkable agencies that we have devised inthe war. ! ou will hear a great deal about i t as weproceed with thi s narrative . Training (which has be


S . O . S .

War, and leave him free to create and deal with thelarger measures . The various sections thus become

m iniature minds of the “C . in C .

” who think and planand sometimes execute for him . By an elaborate and

comprehensive system of condensed diaries he knows

just what they are doing each day.

This Staff system at G . H . Q . and its functionsare duplicated at the Headquarters of the Services o f

Supply except that only G1 , G2 and G4 are repre

sented . The S . O . S . has nothing to do with fighting,there fore i t can di spense with G3 and G5. Its main

sections are G I and G4.

Such , in brie f , i s the di recting force that set up theAmerica in France. Originally it was housed in

Pari s. As our troops began to arrive and our scope

of supply widened those buildings in the French capital proved insufficient . We needed more executive

elbow room . Besides , i t was becoming more and

more important that General Pershing should be up

where his army was beginning to assemble . In Sep

tember, 19 17, we established our General Headquartersat Chaumont, a French town in the North . There

and for the first time in the war— the Stars and Stripeswere un furled almost within sound of the guns . W e

had entered the Great Struggle at last !

I went to those Headquarters not long after they

had been opened . The drowsy little town sti ll bl inked

at the unaccustomed S ight of Americans in uni form ;our troops were few ; there was a sense o f newness

and crud eness. General Pershing and his col leagues

were feeling thei r way through the enormous respon

THE BUSINESS OF WAR 4 :

Sibilities that hemmed them in . Not so many miles

away those pioneer divi sions who blazed our way to

France were shivering in their first billets .I went back last summer. The one-time Sleepy

town was a bee-hive ; the brown of our khaki vied wi th

the verdure o f the hillsides around ; the roads everywhere were alive with our transport ; the General

Headquarters had a seasoned and business-like look ;we had spilled our blood on the soi l o f France ; yougot the thril l and the sense o f actual war participation .

In the same office where I had seen him be fore satthat grave-eyed Commander-in-Chie f , stil l mod est ,stil l unas suming, sti l l consecrated to the task which

in the intervening twelve months had made him aworld figure .

In those General Headquarters , now the nerve centre o f our fighting

,the Services of Supply as at pres

ent constituted were organi sed . When General Persh

ing moved to the North the Chiefs o f Supply eventually followed . They were marshalled under the head

of“Lines of Communication . As our armies grew

and took thei r place in the l ine the need o f a concentrated supply establi shment became evident . It wasfelt— and wi sely— that with our swi ft expansion

G . H . Q . Should be free to devote itsel f to operations.General Pershing there fore appointed a Board con

sisting of ( I use their present ranks ) Brigadier General Johnson Hagood , Colonel Avery Andrews , Brigadier General Frank M cCoy ,

Brigadier General Robert

Davis and Major Pierce Wetherell,to devise a plan to

this end . The net result was that the Supply Depart

S . O . S .

ments were divorced from G. H . Q . and moved toTours . General Headquarters were now free to concentrate on fighting while in that charming little city

on the banks of the Loire , in the heart o f the Chateaucountry

,where Balzac and Rabelais were born ; where

Joan o f Arc came in Shining armour in the crowdedhour of her triumph and where, oddly enough , the

Hun o f other days got his final reverse, became thecapital of the Domain of Supply.

It was early this year when the American flag was

officially broken out at Tours over a quadrangle ofFrench barracks sentinelled by trees and with the

usual large parade ground in the centre . But it was

a much larger kingdom than Supply and Transport

that took up its abode there . Under reorganisation

the Services o f Supply annexed the services o f Quar

termaster Corps , Ordnance, Gas, Air, Engineering,Construction

,Forestry

,Railways and Roads

,Medical ,

Mechanical Transport, Signals and Communications,Postal and Express, War Risk Insurance ; in fact,every detai l that contributed to the upkeep , the sa fety,the combat

,and the renewal o f the armies in the field .

Even Graves Registration , the chronicle of that last

sad chapter in the li fe o f the soldier, found refugeunder its broad and comprehending wings.The first Commanding General was Major General

F. J . Kernan , who developed the whole scheme o f

what was for a brief time called the Services of theRear

,and which is now the unshakable “S . O .

one of the prides , even as i t is also the backbone, of

the whole American Expeditionary Force . To tell

THE BUSINESS OF WAR 43

i ts story there fore i s to describe the activities of everything American in France except that which hap

pens in trench and field .

Nowhere in thi s war will you find such a sel fcontained Empire as is presented by the American Services o f Supply

,indeed— t he whole A . E . F.

It i s unique in the annals o f military organisation .

Wi th the French there i s always Pari s to suggest or

to change ; with the British , the War Office in Whitehal l l ies only a few hours’ journey across the Chan

nel and many miles o f red tape j oin i t to General

Headquarters . But with the American force Washington i s thousands o f miles away in fact and in domi

nation . The distance i s too great and time in war istoo precious to re fer everything to the home powers

that be . They have wisely reposed a confidence in the

leader o f our armies abroad that has been amply

justified by his achievements . Here you have the anti

dote against the costly disasters,bred by the pol itical

interference that hampered great American generals

from Washington down the li ne through Grant toShaf fer.

Geographically the Services of Supply includes al l

Continental France and Great Bri tain for our supply

tentacles have now spread out in many di rections.The domain i s divided into nine Sections and two independent Districts, which are Tours and Pari s. W i thone exception (England ) al l these sections are inFrance .

Each of the French port s that we use i s the nucleusor capital of a Section which also includes some o f

S . O . S .

the adjacent territory. Midway between the coastand the front i s the Huge Intermediate Section

,while

stil l nearer the fighting line i s the Advance Section .

They are all joined by American built and Americanoperated communications.

In examining the organi sation of these Sections

you get the first hint o f that sel f-sufficiency whichi s such an outstanding feature of our army structure

abroad . Every Section i s in command of a Generalwho has the necessary Administrative and TechnicalStaff s . He has absolute control of all matters of discipline , police , and sanitation in hi s bai liwick and has

general supervi sion over all technical activities car

ried on there . It is a little sovereign State . I f a question arises that touches or involves a neighbouring Section

‘

i t becomes , l ike matters Of Interstate Commerce

in the United States,a question of Federal jurisdic

tiOn and goes up to the Commanding General of theServices of Supply who i s the Chie f o f all these subsidiary Generals .It i s just as i f we had established a United States

of Supply overseas with Tours as the Washington .

A S a matter o f fact , Tours is the American capitalof France . The Commanding General of the S .

i s a sort of transplanted President whose only higherauthority i s the Commander-in-Chie f o f the AmericanExpeditionary Force and Whose Staff Officer he i s.Looking at the organisation from another angle

( familiar to most Americans ) , you can see it in terms

of the mi li tary arrangement o f the United States in

peace times . Following thi s analogy, the Headquar


ters of the S . O . S . at Tours corresponds to the WarDepartment at Washington . The diff erent Sections

are like the various Departments such as the Depart

ment of the East, the Southern Dep artment or the

Department of the Southeast . Each of these Depart

ments in the United States has a Commanding General who corresponds to the General in charge of oneof our foreign Sections . The two indepe ndent D i s

tricts (Tours and Pari s) bear the same relation tothe whole overseas organisati on that the United States

Military Academy at West Point bear s to the homestructure, which comes directly under the authorityof the War Department .In addition to control over the General s o f the vari

ous Sections the Commanding General o f the Servi cesof Supply exercises a stewardship over the Chief o fevery Service that makes up hi s immense domain.

The head and staff of all Departments,save Light

Rai lways, which are a necessary adjunct of fighting,are quartered in and about that picturesque quadrangle in Tours, and are accessible at any hour o f theday or night for re ference or di scussion.

Such is the Supply World over which Major General James G . Harbord , who succeeded General Ker

nan as Commanding General o f the S . O . S .

,presides

to-day. He i s big of bone,smooth o f face

,al ive with

humour— a sel f-made soldier ri sen from the ranks

and with a trail of active service that stretches fromthe Philippines to the bloody fields o f France. There

i s no mi staking hi s power and punch . It i s written

in a square and unyielding j aw and i n a determination

S . O . S .

that the Germans learned to thei r cost when his div ision helped to block their way to Pari s last July. Itwas as Chief of Staff to General Pershing in thoseheart-breaking days when first we set up militaryshop abroad that Harbord wrote his wi sdom and hi s

foresight into our overseas preparation . He can lead

and he can rule . He is the highest type o f the Soldier-Admini strator. Study hi s task and you find

that, as the S logan of the S . O . S . well says,“All the

fighting i s not done at the front .”

He operates inpreci sely the same way that GeneralPershing holds forth at Headquarters

,although his

task is somewhat more varied and complex . TheCommander-in-Chie f is mainly concerned , so far asactive duties are concerned

,with fighting. The tools

of thi s bloody trade— mainly men and munitions— are

placed at hi s di sposal . General Harbord, on the otherhand , has to deal with the intri cate problems o f the

procurement,di stribution and maintenance o f these

tools o f war. Every ton of freight and every Amer

ican soldier that enters France must come through

one o f the ports under his jurisdiction. They mustbe classified

,stored or moved to their proper station.

An endless chain of faci lities and a complete and

sleepless control and supervision are requi red.

Yet every morning there i s laid upon hi s desk at

Sheet o f paper on which i s typed the total number o f

American troops,civilian employés and prisoners o f

war in every Section together with all American

troops with the British or French ; the total numberof mouths fed by the A . E . F. ; the preci se amount



of food on hand at every supply depot in days and

rations ; the number of animals in France and the

quantity o f hay,oats and bran available for them ;

the exact quantity o f ammunition in reserve in terms

o f Specific calibres ; the total ship tonnage unloaded

the day be fore ; the number o f cars loaded for ship

ment and the tonnage in them ; the cargoes on everyShip in every port we use i n France or England ; and

the numbe r o f be ds -empty or occupied— in our hos

p itals together with thei r cri si s capaci ty which is the

total hospi tali sation i n case o f emergency. In aword

,thi s marvellous sheet

,cal led the Daily State o f

Supply, i s the up-to-the-hour epitome o f the whole

American situation in France .More than thi s General Harbord

,who is not tem

peram entally inclined to be tied to a desk , spends

three or four days every week— sometimes moretravelling up and down hi s Supply World in hi s spe

cial train which has Sleeping , dining and office cars

and i s a Headquarters on Wheels . He pops in on

Section General s at their offices ; makes sudden de

scents upon loading gangs at the docks or construc

tion units in the field . He can stop hi s train anywhere in France

,hitch up hi s telephone or telegraph

instruments to American wires strung on Americanpoles and talk to General Pershing at General Head

quarters or any one e l se in the country. How areall these miracles achieved !Like the rearing of our whole physical structure in

France, there i s no magic or mystery about it . I tall results from the fact that we have built up a

S . O . S .

compact and co-ordinated system for the conduct ofthe Services o f Supply that is distinctly American in

swi ftness and in efficiency. It i s simply part o f theBusiness o f War, American Brand . To a war that

was believed to express the last word in sc ience and

organi sation we have brought new wrinkles.General Harbord

’

s freedom of action and the re

markable grip on the American situation in France

as revealed on the Dai ly State o f Supply are madepossible first o f all by staff work . The General Staff

o f the Commanding General of the Serv i ces o f Sup

ply, as you have already been told , only includes three

Sections— G1 , G2 and G4— be cause he has no problems of combat or training. Each of these Sectionshas a head

,designated as an Assistant Chie f of Staff .

In charge of G 1 i s Col . J . B . Cavanaugh in command

o f G2 is Lieutenant Colonel Cabot Ward who was oncePark Commissioner o f Greater New York and a fine

type of Reserve or Temporary Oflicer who is renderingconspicuous service in the war, while Col . H . C.

Smither i s at the head of that al l-use ful and uni

ver sal G4.These Assi stant Chie fs in turn report to a Chief o f

Staff — Brigadier General Johnson Hagood . Clean of

l imb and face and a seasoned veteran o f field and staff

service despite his apparent youth,he is a master or

ganiser and a live wire. Under hi s stimulation theGeneral Staff takes the burden o f routine from theshoulders of General Harbord just as the Staff at

the G. H . Q . l ightens the way of the Commander-in

Chief .


The Assistants are in constant touch with the Ch i e f

o f Staff and the Commanding General himsel f . I t is

thei r duty to act in hi s name on the bulk of the executive questions that arise

,and they are many and com

plex. Hence he i s free to move about hi s Kingdom .

As at G. H . Q ,you have a small group o f understudy

minds,although at Tours they have to cope with an

infinite variety o f subj ects . These Ass istants are

guided in making decisions by their knowledge o f the

expressed desi res o f the Commanding General withregard to policies . Hence they must be men o f keenintelligence and quick to grasp significances.

The Section o f G2 i s a minor one in the administration o f the Serv ices o f Supply. There fore the bur

den o f the Staff labours and responsibi liti e s fall upon

the Chief o f Sta ff and the heads o f G I and G4. In

general terms — we will take up the specific work later— GI has authority on al l matters o f administration,organisation and procurement o f pe rsonnel and material from the United States

,which includes the vast

tonnage question, while G4 deals with construction ,transportation and supply

,having particularly in mind

the co— ordination o f all these activities. Both G I andG4 connect up with every unit in the Serv ices of

Supply. By telegraph and telephone and daily report sthey keep in constant communi cation .

Let us now sit in with the General Staff at its daily

morning meeting . You will get such a demonstrationo f snappy team-work as to make you sit up. TheW alls of the office of the Chie f o f Staff — l ike thoseof the Commanding General— reflect the Spiri t of our

so S . O . S .

organi sation and the way i t i s swung. First o f all

you will see the great Supply Map of France crisscrossed with our lines o f communication . At firstglance you may think that this i s a picture puzzle, but

on closer investigation you see that these winding and

coloured avenues are studded with symbo ls. ! ou see

stars in ci rcles,ships

,tents

,crosses

,coffee pots, build

ings. You are not long in finding out what they mean .

At the lower left-hand corner i s a key to the puzzle .

Each symbol has a meaning all its own . The star

in a ci rcle indicates the General Headquarters ; theShip Shows the location of a port that we use ; thetent i s the site of an instruction camp ; the black

cross reveal s a base hospital ; the white cross a rest

station ; the coffee pot a coff ee station for travellingtr00ps ; the engine a locomotive repair shop ; the

freight car a car erection site ; the bumper a rai lway

regulation yard ; an axe a forestry cam p ; the propelleran aviation camp ; the bursting shell an ammunition

depot ; a tiny house means a re frigerating plant ; ablack naval pennant a Section Headquarters, and so

on. In other words,you can look at thi s map and

see at a glance the scope and extent o f all our activi

t ies in France,and what and where they are.

On the wall are also square yards of charts anddiagrams for this i s a war o f organisation all put

down on specifications and blue prints long be fore a

wheel i s turned or a shot fired .

_

It i s one of the many

Sheets Mars has taken from the Book o f Big Busi

ness . I have seen square miles o f army diagrams

in thi s war,but I have never seen any that were more

THE BUSINESS or WAR 5:

concrete or comprehensive than those used by the

Services o f Supply. Every Service has its master

chart ; every subordinate section has its own l ittle

sheet. Put three men together in an army office in

France,and the first thing they do i s to create a

l ittle chart o f thei r organ i sation . Nor is it a wasted

eff ort . A great master of American industry once

said : Teach with the eye, so he put signs all over

hi s factory. The man who knows just what he has

to do and where he belongs seldom makes mistakes.

Hence the value o f the chart in the Business o f War.

A single detai l in General Hagood ’s office reveals

the spirit of the organi sation and why it does things.

Over the large clock hangs a placard containing this

inscription : HURRY UP —C ’EST LA GUERRE

(“It i s the I t reminded me of another Sign

hung up somewhere on our Lines o f Communication

by a bureau chie f who had once been in the Coast

Arti llery. I t proclaimed the warning familiar to al l

coast travel lers : “Cable Crossing. Do Not Anchor

Here . He was determined that his v i sitors should

waste none of his time.

General Hagood i s at hi s desk every morning at

eight o ’clock . These army heads are early to work

and they stay late . There are no office hours i n The

Business o f War. The Chie f of Staff finds on hi s

desk what i s officially known as the Diary . It is a

compact résumé , a complete catalogue of S . O . S .

events , compiled by G4, of every important proceed

ing of the day be fore. This D iary,which i s a s rep

52 S . O . S .

re sentative a piece o f scientific organi sation as theDai ly Supply State , i s arranged under headings.Under Troop Movements you find : “The Nth

Division has been moved to the X Training Camp” ;under Hospitali sation , The construction o f a tenthousand bed hospital has been ordered at Z” ; under

Quarterm aster Corps : “The Chie f Quartermaster has

been ordered to turn over 100 carloads o f sugar tothe French” ; under Remounts :

“Eight thousand

horses are now at the Remount Camp at W”

; under

Construction : “Five new warehouses have been

started at Blank Supply Depot,” and so on unti l every

item o f large value has be en epitomised and chron

icled .

At o ’clock General Hagood has his daily con

ference with the heads o f the Sections . Once moreyou have the Directors’ meeting of the Business o fwar. With the Diary be fore him , which he has al

ready read , the Chie f o f Staff asks the why and the

where fore o f the various steps and changes enum er

ated in i t . In the case o f the movement o f the NthDivision he may ask : “Why did not these troops go

into barracks ! ” or with the item relating to the Chie fQuartermaster he may inqui re : “Is thi s in accord

ance with the terms of our new food agreement withthe French In the matter o f those eight thousandhorses the query may be : “Does this complete the

project for this Remount Camp ! ” while re ferring tothe construction of the new warehouses he may ask :“Is thi s depot proceeding towards construction on

schedule t ime


THE BUSINESS OF WAR

I cite these questions to Show, first o f all , how the.Chief puts an unerring probe into everything that i s

done ; second , by knowing just what i s being done

within twenty-four hours a fter i t has be en started

he can recti fy any mistake be fore it has gone too far.

This i s especially true o f large construction such as

barracks and warehouses . It also applies with special

importance to the shi fting of the labour battalions .One great value o f thi s Diary and the operations

that contribute to it, i s that i t disposes o f matters at

once . In the old army day and way every individuali tem that I have mentioned ( and in fact everything

that re ferred to any phase o f army work ) , not only

had to be mulled over and indorsed by a dozen pe ople

but l iterally had to break its way through miles o f

red tape . Instead of swi ft action there was interm i

nable delay which clogged the wheels o f progress .

In the case of the S . O . S . the Chie f o f Staff , expressing the desires o f the Commanding General forwhom he acts , delegates authority to hi s subordinates,the heads o f the various Sections . They act upon thei r

own judgment and the information they possess,and

the result is that there i s no hampering in eff ort.Now you can see why the Commanding General i s

free to move about his domain and also why the

Chie f of Staff l ikewise has a clean desk and can turn

at once to any large emergency that ari ses . It allcombines for a flexible system of supe rvision and

supply. The men at the helm are not desk-bound,

and the myriad o f personnel and material they control are equally elasti c .

S . O . S .

The Diary i s only one of a series o f reports which

deal with the Progress o f Supply. A S a sort o f corol

lary to the Daily State o f Supply is a document called

The Dai ly S ituation,which is a miniature typewrit

ten newspaper , prepared by G4 and which goes tothe Commanding General and the Chie f o f Staff with

the Daily State . It i s a General Summary of vital

problems that cannot be discussed in the Diary, which

deals only with actual events . It detai ls, for example,such emergencies as temporary congestions in the rai l

way regulating stations . It also deals with the tie-upsin troop traffic

,with tonnage difficulties

,with troop

arrivals,with the ammunition situation

,indeed al l the

many unexpected emergencies that try the soul of thearmy administrator Operating three thousand miles

from his home base and in a country where he mustwrestle W lth strange laws and employ public carriers

that have systems and regulations not altogethergeared up to swi ft and strenuous American ways .

When any one o f these contingencies develops theChie f o f Staff or the head o f G4, or both , at once

calls a meeting o f the Chie f o f the Service involved

and hi s principal associates and threshes it out . Thus

he gets at the speciali sts who know exactly what they

can do and who have the wherewithal to do it.

By now you will have gathered that both G I and

G4 are important links in the American Army machine . It i s high time there fore that we look into

thei r ram ified functions . They unfold a system o f

scrutiny and co-ordination that i s l ittle less than a

triumph of organisation . Nothing in the whole rec


ord of army administration surpasses them in theperfection and execution of detai l . Yet it was al lconceived and is

,in the main

,dominated and oper

ated by regular soldiers who have come from camp

and field to sweat over charts, telegrams and sta

tistics. Again you discover that all the fighting i s

not at the front— that war i s work and worry.

We will begin with G1 . Although it deals withadministration and organisation

,i t s chie f work i s

procurement o f men and material from the United

States. Here you touch the supreme problem o f the

A . E . R , which is tonnage. So far a s the United

States are aff ected , th i s i s a War o f Tonnage . Every

square foot o f cargo space i s precious and must be

uti li sed to the last cubic inch . Every se rvice in France

wants all the tonnage it can get . The movement o f

troops and there fore thei r needs,exceeds all original

estimates . The furnace of war must be kept fuelled .

The lot of G I there fore i s not an easy one .

Since there is only a certain amount of tonnage

available i t follows that it must be allotted,or “allo

cated” as the arm y phrase goes , to the best possible

advantage . This allocation i s the pivot around which

G I works . Now we get to the first actual l ink wi thWashington which , through the Ship-Control Comm ittee of the Shipping Board

,i s the Tonnage Pro

vider. On the tenth o f every month G I in France

wires to Major General George W . Goethals,assist

ant Chie f o f Staff,to find out how much tonnage i s

available for France the next month . He W i res back

the amount . For the sake of i llustration let us say

56 S . O . S .

that i t i s tons. This figure then becomes asort of target of attack , because all overseas demandsare focussed on it . It is l ike a cake set out for consumption before a hungry crowd . Everybody wants

to get as big a slice as possible . The troubles of

G I begin .

The‘

allocation of tonnage i s based on the Requirements of the various army serv ices abroad . The task

there fore i s to balance al l these requirements so thatevery need will be met and in the priority o f that

need . Hence Priority,which has come to be such

an important factor in Industry as well as War, takes

its station in the big game .This i s what happens : I f G I finds that

tons of shipping are available it will allot, let us say'for the simp lest explanation , tons to the

Quartermaster ’ s Corps ; tons to the MedicalCorps

,tons to the Engineers , and tons

to Mechanical Transport . There are o f course many

other serv ices,but these four will serve our purpose .

Every head o f a Service now makes up his Priori ty Schedule in the order o f the urgency o f hi s needs.In the general priority programme Food , Fuel , Forageand Cloth ing always come first. In our hypotheti calcase the Quartermaster has tons to his credit .He cannot touch that fixed reserve o f ninety days.

Likewise the monthly automatic supply must be keptmoving . On the other hand , he has a host o f other

supplies to obtain . There fore he must do some juggling. He must determine whether rolling kitchens

should come ahead of army wagons ; i f j am should


have precedence over overcoats, and i f vinegar i smore important than olive oil. In the same way theChief Surgeon must decide whether arnica outrankscastor oil ; the Director o f Mechani cal Transport must

determine i f the bulk of his space is to be used fortrucks instead of passenger cars , while the Chie f

Engineer must decide whether fabricated buildingsor construction tools have the precedence . I have only

used one or two typical items . As a matter of fact,many thousands enter into the combined tonnage estimates of the A . E . F.

All these requi sitions,made up in the order of thei r

priorities,go to G I

,which censors them ,

and then

transmits them to the United States by cable,which

leaves France not later than the middle o f the month .

This means that the Requisitions for July shipment

must go by June 15th . Requisitions for replacements

o f men are made in exactly the Same way, and there

i s a priority for human beings just as there i s for

Food and Supplies .G I

,however

,does not use up all its tonnage for

these regular Requisitions. It must keep a surplus

to meet the many excepti onal , that i s, unexpected demands . Then , too , the heads of Services frequentlychange thei r Requisitions

,which means a fresh cable

gram to Washington from G I . On the back o f thi scable, for office re ference, you see thi s tonnage incubic feet . G I must know to the pound just howmuch of i ts space i s being used up . All thi s actual

allocation of tonnage is done by the G I of the Serviceso f Supply. The senior G1 at G . H . Q . i s only used as

58 S . O . S .

a Supreme Court in Shaping the larger tonnage prob

lems .Allotting space i s only one phase of GI ’s tonnagej ob . It must keep its finger on the pulse o f the whole

ceaseless ship movement between America and

France . It must know how and when cargoe s are

unloaded and when ships start back . What is known

as “Turn Around” — the round trip— must be made

as quickly as possible both for tr00p and cargo ves

sels . Take a look at the so-called Tonnage Room ,

and you wil l see how thi s difficult task i s made easy,v i sible and comprehensive . It is another revelation

of what American system can accomplish when

geared up to the Business o f War.The walls of the Tonnage Room tell the story.

They are hung with Charts of Tonnage Progress.

! ou can stand in the centre o f thi s Chamber of Revelation and see

,in coloured lines

,figures and diagrams

that a child can understand,just what i s going on in

every port . There i s a Chart for every port in

France. Up and down one side of the Chart i s a

list of individual cargo items to be unloaded, suchas lumber

,coal

,forage

,rai lway supplies , foodstuff s,

clothing , Quartermaster’ s supplies and construction

material . A black line radiating from each item meansits Receipts ; a red line indicates the progress of the

Evacuation of those Receipts . I f the black line i s

longer than the red it shows that cargo i s pi ling upat the ports. I f these lines are the same length all

is well and the stuff is moving out, which means nocongestion . These lines are marked off i n days and


60 S . O . S .

ends the moment men and material get to France.

G4 then takes them up , establi shes the priority by

which they are distributed, and sees that they are de

livered to thei r proper station . This means that i f

the Engineers need construction material more than

the Signal Corps require wires or poles, this mate

rial gets the right o f way over the transportation

faci lities . It is up to G4 to maintain a saturatedsolution of all supplies in France and keep that solu

tion liquid and moving.

S tudy the work of G4 and you find one o f the mostamazing detai ls of our whole army S ituation . There

i s nothing like it in any o f the many armies with

whom I have been in contact in thi s war. It i s not

only the stabili ser o f the war machine, but it i s l ikewise the door be fore whom all the complications and

anxieties o f the A . E . F . are laid . Its long arm

reaches everywhere ; i t dwells with both the working

and fighting armies ; i t i s the regulating station forarmy policies— the Great Shock Absorber. Apply G4to any great American Corporation and it could pick

up the threads o f its activities overnight and carry

them on to success . Like the host i t succours it i s

ti reless and sleepless . It must meet every emergencywithout batting an eye . Its story i s a continuous

record o f dramatic event .Last July, when the swi ft German advance menaced Paris, Brigadier General George Van Horn

Moseley, head o f G4 at G . H . Q. , was on a tour of

inspection in the field . General Pershing, as history

now knows,had to hurl an army to the rescue and

THE BUSINESS OF WAR 6 1

in a sector which was far outside the prescribed andequipped zone o f our operations . That heroic littlearmy had to be fed and supplied and without delay.

On the spot General Moseley dev i sed a whole systemo f emergency supply which kept pace with that army

and met every need . A hal f a dozen telegrams did

the job. In one he converted a certain Intermediate

Storage Depot into an Advance Depot,charged with

the task o f feeding and supplying thi s fighting army.

Another wire established a new regulating station ; a

thi rd marshalled ammunition,transport o f al l kinds

and reserves at certain designated points . In less

than twenty-four hours this whole emergency scheme

to provide every kind o f war sustenance was in working order.The army wanted some ration carts . The Advance

Depot wired back that i t had none,and did not know

where they could be obtained , whereupon General

Moseley sent back a telegram which said in substance“It i s not material where you get them but you must

provide them They came up the next day . Thi s

is the way the G4 works .Technically charged with Construction

,Transpor

tation and Supply,” i ts organisation i s so compact

that not a single army serv ice in France escapes itsministrations. Division A deals with Supply

,Equip

ment , Mechanical Transport , Remounts , Fire Preven

tion , Salvage Service , Graves Registration , Supply

Stati stics and Office Administration . Under it the

D iary of Activities that i s laid on General Hagood ’ sdesk every morning and which I have described, i s

62 S . O . S .

prepared . Division B deals with Troop Movements

( not strategically but as a transportation matter) ;Billets and Billeting , Initial Equipment , Rents , Req

uisitions and Claims, while Division C has to do with'

Construction,Railway Transportation

,the Army

Transport Service,Labour and Priority

‘

of Shipment

in France . Typical of the foresight of G4 i s Division D

,which i s “Plans for Future Expansion and

Development .

G4 does not physically carry out any of these many

activities,but its task i s to co-ordinate all o f them ;

to see that they do not clash ; to reconcile deficit with

surplus ; in short to keep the wheels turning day and

night . I f Construction is to be minimised it i s G4that finds storage areas ; i f freight cars are short it

digs them up somewhere ; i f evacuation of tonnagein ports is behind Receipts it finds labour battalions

to speed up the work . It i s both Provider and Accel

erator— a sort of glorified and many-Sided Policemanto whom the American Army abroad tells its troubles .

Following the ways o f the American business cor

poration, G4 has its Suggestion Box in the shape o fa Suggestion Officer who i s constantly in the field .

He travels from Section to Section , investigatingwork and recommending plans for betterments , la

bour-saving or expansion . I f he sees that switching

facilities in a storage yard are handicapped he sug

gests additional engines ; i f he finds that working

units can be consolidated he says so. All these suggestions are discussed in a meeting o f G4 and i f found

feasible are at once put into eff ect.


At the head o f the pyramid of G4 organisationsits the eagle-eyed and dynam i c Colonel H . C.

Smither,with a mind like a steel trap and an instinct

for order that i s almost uncanny. At his right hand

is hi s no less energetic and big-vi sioned colleague,Colonel J . H . Poo le, who went from the regular arm y

into commerce , got all the benefit o f Big Business andi s back on the military j ob again . He i s the Deputy

Assistant Chief of Staff . Under thei r combined direction the remarkable Dai ly Supply State and the

Daily Summary are prepared . These men , l ike the

late E . H . Harriman , l ive a l i fe that i s geared up to

the telephone and telegraph . There i s not an houro f the twenty-four that the lights are not burn ingin the offices o f G4 o f the Services of Supply.

Problems of significant policy as aff ecting thewhole Expeditionary Force are of course re ferred

by Tours to the G4 o f G . H . Q. , which wisely allows

its Opposite number in the S . O . S . every latitude.The senior G4 at G . H . Q. , however, i s more activelyconcerned with the co —ordination o f the supplies and

the activities o f the armies in the field who are so

near at hand .

Where does Washington figure in thi s sel f-contained Service o f Supply which l inks port with trench !It pays the bills and acts as Purchasing and Forwarding Agent . The cables bring the A . E . F . needsto a desk in the State

,War and Navy Building,

where Major General George W . Goethals sits asAssistant Chie f of Staff in charge of Purchase

,Stor

age and Traffic— a task infinitely bigger than what

S . O . S .

confronted him at Panama . From that desk in turnradiates the process of Production and Transpo rtation that fi lls the orders and sees that the goods go

steaming to France . I t involves the Control of RawMaterial s

,the establishment of Supply Zones and

Warehouses in the United States ; the scouring Of the

whole world o f output and shipping— all to the end

that our fighting man abroad i s fed and equipped .

And he gets what he wants.We have followed supplies from contract to th e

borders o f consumption ; to that far-away domain

where the genius o f American organ i sation,now to

be revealed , i s fit comrade to the valour it sustains .We atoned for delay with thoroughness ; we met thatone-time rebuke with kindling performance.

III— A rmy Tracks and Trafifc

ILL BROWN,who once drove a Santa Fe

“Mogul” across the Kansas Prairies, hitched

up his grimy khaki overalls and looked out of

the cab of hi s monster consolidation locomotive

marked U. S . which had le ft its Philadelphia

maker less than a month be fore and which now

panted alongside a quay at St. Nazai re in France.

A scene of incessant action unfolded before him . In

the lock basin was a forest o f funnels and masts o f

American ships whose gay camouflage gleamed in the

sunlight . From one o f them a ninety-ton naval gunswung ashore as easi ly as a bale of hay ; from an

other, five-ton motor trucks were lowered as lightly.

Cranes creaked the plantation melodies o f the Sunny

South , sung by negro stevedores, mingled with the

song of Chinese coolie s who formed a continuousline of cargo carriers from deck to dock .

In the yards nearby dozens of huge American en

gines, hauling endless chains of American cars,loaded with American supplies

,snorted off to Amer

ican depots, often on American tracks sentinelled by

American poles down which flashed American messages sent and received by American men and women .

Likewise for mi les up and down the winding inland65

S . O . S .

waterways American tugs , pull ing American boats,chugged along bearing thei r burden of American

freight and responsibi lity. Day and night and with

an eff ort as ceaseless as the tide o f tonnage that

beats on those stricken shores o f France,i s the move

ment of American freight and transport over there.What was happening in the port that made BillBrown blink hi s eye and breathe a l ittle faster was

happening in more than hal f a dozen ports along

that same French coast with varying degrees of va

rie ty and volume but always with the same unendingaction . Again we are con fronted by a miracle O f

expansion . In January o f 19 18 we were unloading tons a month ; in July this had grown

to tons . As late as March we thought thatlanding troops in France was a big thirty

days’ record,yet in July exactly stepped

ashore . Men and material were handled, supplied

and , what was equally important , transported to theirproper destination .

It i s all made possible by the Empire of Transportation whose teeming docks, tracks and traffic consti

tute one of the marvels of our overseas effort . Overi t i s laid the strong hand o f compact organi sation ;galvanising it i s an energy typically American inspiri t and execution . At the throttle i s an all-starcast of famous railroad and steamship officials whoseunited salaries in times o f peace would almost floata big city’ s allotment of a Liberty Loan . Yet they

toi l in France for a Major ’ s or a Colonel’

s pay.

In the preceding chapters I tried to describe the


S . O . S .

m inals— a whole rai lway system— had to be reared.

All thi s requi red organisation, labour and the where

withal to build and operate .Almost with our declaration o f War we real i sedthis enormous transport responsibility. It was an

expert j ob and had to be blocked out by experts.Before General Pershing and his S taff set out on

thei r historic j ourney to France to plant the American flag on the soi l of freedom a Rai lway Commis

sion,named by the Secretary o f War with the aid o f

Mr. S . M . Felton , sai led from New York to investigate dock and traffic conditions and recommend a

plan for the American system . The senior member

was (M aljor William Barclay Parsons, an eminentengineer who had constructed the first subways in

New York . The other members were : W. J . Wi l

gus,who had been Vice-President o f the New York

Central,who had , among other things, laid the plans

for the electrification of that system and who hadbeen commissioned a Major in the Reserve Corps ;Captain A . B . Barber, o f the Enginee r Corps, United

States Army ; W. A. Garrett, who had had wide experience as a transportation official ; and F . de St.Phalle , a

‘ motive power and rolling stock expert whowas an officer of a great locomotive works in Philadelphia . They represented a combined experience

that was an immense asset in their ram ified investigations

,which began at the War Office in London and

practically covered every line o f communication used

by the Allied armies in France. The recomm enda

tions of thi s Commission, and more especially the de

ARMY TRACKS AND TRAFFIC 69

tai ls suggested by Major, now Colonel Wilgus,formed the basi s of the whole immense and far-flungstructure through which the li fe-blood of our armies

in France rushes to-day.

That Commission found the available French portsand thei r docks already overburdened with tonnage

and most of them with inadequate and obsolete equipment . The four great strategic rai lways o f France,running from the North to the South , were carryingnearly al l the traffic that the rails could bear. Even

the canals were blocked . France ’ s man-power was

nearing depletion,the available sources o f supplies

well-nigh exhausted . I t all meant that America wouldnot only have to construct but also bring her labourand material f rom home .One of the first acts of the Commission there fore

was to cable for Engineers. Thus it came about thatin the vanguard o f the millioned fighting host that

later crossed the sea came those gallant Engineer regi

ments who have recorded in France an epic of achievement that must stand out as one o f the bri lliant perform ances of the whole American ExpeditionaryForce.

Nine Engineer regiments were sent. Five were forRai lway Construction ; three for Rai lway Operation ;while the third was a Shop regiment. They were recruited from rai lway cab

,switch

,round house and

shop. Every man was a volunteer. Some of the

units went straight to France ; others by way of

England .

Five of the regiments marched through London on

70 S . O . S .

that historic August day o f 19 17 when Britain got

her ini tial V iew of our men in khaki and when forthe first time an alien army

,under its arms and flags, “

paraded the British capital . Whitehall , Regent Street,Pall Mall , Piccadi lly— indeed al l the hear t o f London-W ere aflutte r with American flags and noisy witha dea fening cra’sh of cheers . I saw those five regi

ments march p'

ast King George as he stood at salute

tin front O f Buckingham Palace — an unforgettablespectacle in a war that has given me some m emor

able pictures . As those stalwarts swung along a British Major General who stood by my side

,sai d to

me“Those regulars of yours march wellThey are not regulars

,

” I replied . Six weeksago they were running locomotives

,bui lding tracks,

or operating lathes in the United States.”“Extraordinary

,

” was hi s response .That parade through London was the last spec

f acular appearance that the American Engineers

made . Henceforth from battlefield to dock they wereto toi l as no labourers have ever toi led be fore . Eventheir departure from England had its dramatic touch- a suggestion o f that famous episode “in Belgium ’ scapital” be fore Waterloo as told by Byron in “ChildeHarold . In London was Charles G . Dawes

,former

Comptroller o f the Currency and now PurchasingAgent of the A . E . F . in France . He had left hisbank in Chicago to become a Lieutenant Colonel

he i s now a Brigadier— in one o f the Engineer regiments. He gave some of his fellow officers a dinner


at the Carlton Hotel which was to be followed by atheatre party. Part of thi s regiment had been assigned to the Briti sh Army in France . As the Americans sat at dinner a hurry-up call came from theWar Office to depart for the front early next morn

ing.

“All right,” was the response . We will be

ready. The port from which they were to em bark

was a three-hour j ourney by rai l from London . Colo

nel Dawes chartered a fleet of taxi cabs and saw hissocial programme through . The next morning these

officers,having journeyed from midnight to dawn

by motor, were on hand to leave with their men .

Within a week I saw some of them laying track

under fire up the Somme . I t was a group of theseEngineers who

,in that first great battle be fore Cam

brai when a Briti sh Army was well-nigh overwhelmed

by numbers last year, threw away picks and shovels,grabbed guns and leaped to action . It was another

company o f the same uni t who , when the fate o f

Amiens trembled in the balance las t spring, did thesame heroic trick and became part o f Brigadier Gen

eral Carey’ s fam ous “scratch” army that saved that

day so full of other di saster to the Allied cause.Such i s the spiri t of the American Engineers who

built the foundation and much o f the structure o f our

transportati on system in France ; the type o f organisation a detachment of which laid nearly three mi lesof narrow gauge railroad in seven hours while two

companies bui lt two warehouses containing

square feet in eight hours and a hal f !

Go to any one of the ports that we use in France,

S . O . S .

and you wi l l see the results o f their labours whichbegan with bare hands and improvi sed too ls. Forthe sake o f i llustration I will use two maj or ports.

The first— Base Section Numbe r One ( St . Nazaire )-i s that historic one-time fishing town which will

always be bound to the United States by sentimental

ties and where the first American ExpeditionaryForce set foot on French soi l . In August, 19 17, the

whole dock and unloading facili tie s were not only

hopelessly inadequate for our needs but the pros

pect of increasing them was equally disheartening.

Although there were two large lock basins the an

chorage outside was inadequate, while the discharging faci lities were lamentably poor. Only six ships

of tons each could be discharged simultane

ously. The dock buildings were old and rat-ridden ;there were a few rusty cranes ; the beds of the rai l

road tracks alongside had bogged in the wet ground .

We had no barges for l ightering. When our firstlocomotives arrived in a deep-draught ship we had

to use an ocean-going steamer for a lighter ; trans ferthe engines to her deck and then bring them into

one o f the basins in thi s crude and cumbersome way.

Such were the handicaps under which we labouredfor months.But those Enginee rs got busy and they made the

miracle happen . At the outse t a discharge oftons a day was considered an immense performance

at this port ; in October that same port dischargedexactly tons. We had not only rebuilt those

tottering warehouses but in thi s port and in the great


Base Supply Depot at Montoir, four miles away, wehad constructed fi fty great warehouse s that compri se

a City'

o f Supply. We have linked those docks andwarehouses wi th more than a hundred miles of tracks

and spurs— some of them on concrete road-bed . The

proj ect has a trackage equal to that of Altoona, which

i s a nerve-centre of the Pennsylvan ia system with twohundred and fi fty miles of rails. We have increasedthe basin * facilities unti l to day there are be rths for

twenty-one Ships o f big tonnage. Fourteen vesselscan di scharge at the same time .The A . E . F . in France, with the Pershing fore

sight that made our whole achievement possible,al

ways looks ahead,and there i s now in course of con

struction an American pier nearly feet long,built on American piles, that eventually wi ll accommodate sixteen vessels. The way I saw thi s pier

driven far out into the river day after day withamazing rapidity made the French sit up . Accustom ed to putting down massive concrete foundations,they stood speechless at the spectacle o f American

pi les pounded in at the rate of two hundred a day.

We drove twelve to every one that the French couldput down . Not content with working these wonders

on quay and road-bed , our Engineers have installeda complete water supply for the town

,which meant

the construction of complete waterworks and a pumping station with a capacity of gallons aday. A -gallon rese rvoi r was simply one fea

ture of the proj ect.! ou are not surp rised when I tel l you that two

S . O . S .

men largely responsible for the consummation of

this work are Lieutenant Colonel William G. Atwood ,who in civi l li fe drove the Alaska Cen tral through

the snows and rigors o f the frozen North , and MajorC . S . Coe, the wizard who built the famous viaducto f the Florida East Coast Rai lway out across the

sea-sprayed ree fs where experts had said no man

could build . The Commanding Officer o f thi s En

gineer regiment, I might add, was Colonel John S .

Sewell, who i s now in command o f the whole BaseSection upon which his men have left such an endur

ing mark.

All this was not done without labour. The fourhundred coloured stevedores

,yanked from sunny cot

ton plantation to the bitter winter coast o f France,were - the nucleus o f the labour battalions now Operating in this Base Section which number Withthe willing

,cheer ful

,and uncomplaining toi l of these

black heroes in khaki many o f our wonders have be enachieved . It was one o f these Southern darkies whocontributed a classic story o f the war. When Gen

eral Pershing visited thi s port he made a speech tothe stevedores complimenting them on thei r splendid

work. He concluded by saying that while he realisedthat every one o f them wanted to fight some one hadto stay behind and do their work . He added, how

ever, that the men with the be st recordswould have

a chance to go“over the top .

” This phrase causedmuch discussion among the negroe s , some o f whom

had never heard i t . Every one had his own defini

tion. Finally one of them rose up and said


S . O. S .

those myri ad difficulties hedge in those gallant menin khaki . To begin with , the land was swampy and

low, fi lled in with si lt,mud

,garbage and the decom

posed re fuse of a cam p o f Anamites, the Indo—Chinese coolies who are employed as labourers by theFrench

,British and American arm1es ln thousands .

Hip-deep in this frightful fi lth our men toiled allthrough the bitter winter of 19 17

-19 18 .

The French said that i t would take three years atleast, possibly five , to build these wharves . It tookthose American s less than eight months

,and thi s

meant the rearing o f nearly a mile of docks,washed

by the highest tide in France ; the erection of concreteplat forms with four lines o f tracks ; e ight immense

warehouses ; the installation o f ten electri c five andten-ton cranes which straddle these tracks and li ft

huge parcels ranging from bundles o f cases of cannedgoods to whole motor trucks direct from Ship to car.Nearly cubic fee t of lumber

,most of i t

brought from the United States,were used In thi s

enterpri se . That sea of filth and swamp and garbage

i s now a whirlpool O f action -a miniature Duluththat rings with the riot o f a mighty tonnage handledwithout delay. Where once two Ships were unloadedin a week fourteen American vessels— a thri ll ingsight as they stretch out in unbroken l ine, a re

buke to German submarine perils — are now dis

charged at the som e time . A ceaseless stream of supplies flows from thei r hatches.I have only presented one side of the construction

picture at this port. Nine mi les away at St . Sulpice


and where a year ago stretched hundreds of acres offarm and vineyard

,has risen what may well be called

“The City that Grew Over-Night.” Here has ari senanother one of our enormous Base Supply Depots

( you will read more of them in the next chapter) ,

with a million and a hal f feet of covered storage

space and three million feet of open storage in use.

Linking thi s community with port i s another system

o f tracks and switches— that whole net-work of rai lway receiving, classification and departure yards that

are such a necessary part of our whole supply sys

tem . Once more you have the marvel of labour

expansion,for the forty original stevedores of last

autumn have grown into the army of five thousand

that toil s night and day. At first these labour battalions slept in tents

,in the open ai r

,anywhere they

could lay thei r heads. Thei r spiri t of sacrifice i s onlyequalled by that kindred spirit o f sel f-effacement ofthi s regiment o f Engineers (which includes hundredsof college men working with axe and spade ) whichwent to France to bui ld railways and which has done

everything from installing plumbing fixtures,shower

baths and bakery ovens in camps to building docks,dams, fire stations and hospitals. This unit , and thework it has done i s merely typical of what al l theEngineer organ i sations have done

,was originally in

command of Colonel J . B . Cavanaugh ; who le ft that

battleground of pick and pile to become head of theno less important

,i f less physically exacting, G1 at

the Headquarters of the S . O . S .

In this necessarily brie f and bird ’s-eye viewof what

S . O . S .

we have done in these two ports you get an idea o fwhat has been going on in various ways at the others

that we use . Everywhere we have dug and dredged ;laid down tracks ; built warehouse s ; set up machinery ;all to the end that ships could be be rthed and thei r

cargo unloaded .

But thi s was just the initial phase of the largertraffic task . The men and freight had to be cvacuated from the ports and sent to depot, camp , project

and the front . We had to have a transportation

system all our own and , once launched , it followedwith a rapidity that almost rivalled the growth o f the

seaboard faci lities. Summed up here i s what hashappened

On July Ist, 19 17, i t did not exi st . Twelve monthslater saw i t complete in every Working departmentand operating a system o f rai lways larger than anyimportant group in the United States . It handles

tens of thousands o f tons o f supplies at many ports ;owns hundreds of locomot ives and thousands of carsall erected in France ; repairs worn-out French , Bel

gian and its own equipment in enormous shops ; has

a personnel of over officers and men andconducts a canal system which vies with that of Holland . Starting with operations at a single port i t i sin full swing from the Channel to the Mediter ranean .

From a French train in charge o f an American officer

our supply-carrying scope has grown to an all-American train— crew, equipment, freight, everything

Yankee except the rails— which runs from the sea

to the borderland O f fighting, a distance of 482 mi les.


The complete operation o f a French railway for bothcivi l and mili ta ry traffic by Americans i s among thenear possibil ities o f a war that has made the impos

sible possible.Our whole transportation scheme in France was

started right , because that original Rai lway Commis

sion— wise in its foresight— reali sed that our railwaystructure overseas must be dominated by se asoned

railroad men. Bri ti sh experience justified thi s judg

ment. It was not unti l that Wizard o f Traffic and

Master-Doe r . in\Var, Si r Eric Geddes, had beentaken from hi s desk as General Manager of the North

Easte rn Rai lway in England and ultimately made

Director General o f Transportation o f the British

Expeditionary Force that the light rai lways beganto follow the trai l o f the Tommy and the whole wartransportation proposition bri stled with results . We

there fore escaped the costly mistake of first entrusting our rai lways to soldi ers without practical experience.

The beginning o f our Transportation Department

dates from July,19 17, when three members of the

Commi ssion— Major Parsons,Major llVilgus and

Captain Barbe r— were assign ed to the Chie f Eh

gineer of the A . E . F . ,then Colonel and now Briga

dier General Harry Taylor, and instructed to formulate a plan . Major Parsons

,however

, got permis

sion to rejoin his regiment of Engineer s ; Captain

Barber was assign ed to Staff duty, so Major Wilgus

was le ft on the job and with only one as sistant'

Captain L. A . Jenny, who had le ft the New York

80 S . O . S .

Central Rai lway to accompany General Pershing to

France.Under conditions as picturesque as they were re

markable was the birth o f this system . In a backroom of a bui lding at 149 Boulevard Haussmann inParis

,then the Engineering Headquarters o f the

A. E . F. ,using an army packing case for a desk and

seated on an empty starch box ( for there was praetically no office furniture ) Major Wilgus , aided by

Captain Jenny,prepared what i s technically known

as Requisition Number Six— the first definite step

toward the creation of that far-flung steam-drivenorganisation which to-day l inks up all our whole

overseas ports. This document was a Bill of Material , in term s of gauges , units, initial stocks and

monthly needs,for the equipment of a complete

transportation system from spikes to locomotives for

an army o f undetermined size and for a year In ad

vance . Nothing just like i t had ever been done before . It was based on pure assumption backed upby technical knowledge. Tribute to its accuracy isthe astonishing fact that it remains to day the basi sof the whole automatic rai lway supply for our Ex

peditionary Force . Expanded i t could easi ly meet

the requirements o f a system equal to that of thePennsylvania or the New York Central . Henceforth— as in the case o f the Automatic Food Supply— it

was only necessary to cable for quantities of suppliesindi cated on this Master Requisition . Thi s docu

ment was cabled to America— oddly enough— ou

July 14th ( Bastille Day) — a date memorable alike

ARMY TRACKS AND TRAFFIC 8 1

in French history and also,by reason of thi s event,

in the annals o f rai lway transportation .

M eanwhile some step had to be taken to organisea working Department . The Lines o f Communica

tion 3

( forerunner o f the Services of Supply ) had

been established with Brigadier General R . M .

Blatch ford in command . Transportation logi cal lybelonged to hi s domain , so Major Wilgu s was madea member of hi s staff as Director of Railways . Early

in August, 19 17 , the first pe rsonnel came out to helphim in the shape of a few dra ftsmen

,stenographers

and clerks . They were the outposts o f that army ofpractical rai lroad men now in France who le ft j obs

ranging from $ 140 a month as a Signalman to $100,

000 a year as President and General Manager, to dothei r bi t abroad .

From the start General Pershing was convinced

that the head o f hi s rai lway system must be a manof large experience in managing commercial railways

at home . In thi s bel ie f he cabled to the Secretary ofWar on July 29th suggesting that the ablest rai lroad

men in the United States be sent over. After a careful canvass Mr . Baker asked W . W. Atterbury, then

Vice-President in charge o f Operations of the Penn

sylvania Railroad , i f he would go to France andundertake the all-important task of Director Generalof Transportation . Mr . Atterbury accepted ; sai led

at once, and arrived in Pari s on August 3 l st. He

found transportation plans launched under the direction of Major Wilgus, and not only endorsed thembut declared that he was content to return to the

S . O . S .

United States and leave the Director o f Rai lways incharge. Since Mr. Atterbury had been sent by the

Secretary o f War Major Wilgus believed that thearrangement should stand . When the Chie f Engineer

communicated thi s desi re to G . H . Q. , General Pershing formally appointed Mr. Atterbury Director Gen

eral o f Transportation without military rank. Sub

sequently he was made a Brigadier General . The

Commander-in-Chie f asked Major Wilgus to j oin

the General Staff . Mr. Atterbury, however,pressed hi s need o f him so strongly that he remained

in the work that he had launched as Deputy DirectorGeneral of Transportati on . Thus two strong men ,each with a di stinguished serv i ce, j oined for the gi

gantic service that lay ahead .

General Atterbury brought to his post a typicalAmerican rai lroad training. Although a Yale grad

uate in mechanical engineering he rose from artisan

in overall s in the Pennsylvania shops at Altoona toone o f the supreme posts in the system . An organ

i ser and an achiever,he at once made things happen ,

but not unti l he had found out what had to be done,how to do it

,and what help was needed . His first

action,there fore

,was to take a trip over all the

rai lways and port s that we were to use .

As a result,and to declare a general working pol

icy, he approved a plan adopted in the early dayswhich committed the American Expeditionary Force

to running its own trains made up of American locomotives and cars and manned by American crews

under trackage rights over French rai lroads by sev



eral routes from the sea to the front, which meant ,all l ines considered, a di stance o f six hundred miles .This remains the scheme under which we operate .At the same time the Light Railways which are real ly

part of the operations of the Combat Armywere putin charge o f Brigadier General W . C . Langfitt, whi lethe control of Roads fell to Brigadier General J . H .

M cKinstry .

The “D . G . o f T . ( as the head o f Transportation iscalled for short ) was now free to concentrate on thestandard gauge steam j ob. His ideal was to create

an army railway organisation just like any Americancommercial rai lway system , and thi s is precisely whathe has done in every detai l from top to bottom ,

includ

ing a Lost Baggage Division . To day it only diff ers

in all major respects from the Harriman or Hill sys~

tems in that i t does not have to solicit business and

has no financial worries . Other anxieties, however,make up for thi s immunity from money troubles . It

meant having a President,Vice-President

,a General

Manager with al l necessary aids charged with operation , maintenance o f way and equipment ; a Business

Manager to look a fter fi scal matters,and a Chief

Engineer for design and construction .

With the approval of the “C . i n C. , General Atterbury fil led these posts with live rai lroad men of hisown choosing. Now came the first appe arance of an

All-Star Cast in the Great Drama of American Railway Operation in France . J . A . M cCrea, son of thelate President of the Pennsylvania Railroad

,retired

from the General Managership of the Long Island

84 S . O. S .

Rai lway to become General Manager o f the American Army system abroad ; C . M . Bunting le ft hi s

desk as Comptroller of the Pennsylvam a to be Business Manager ; and H . C . Booz went from Assistant

Chief Engineer of the same system to become En

gineer of Construction over there. M . C . Kennedychanged from the Presidency of the Cumberland

Valley Railroad to be Deputy Director General o f

Transportation in England, where our troop and

freight activities were soon to be extensive . All four

were made Colonels soon a fter thei r arrival andmerged into the military establishment. With Gen

eral Atterbury , and Colonel Wilgus , who had beenpromoted

,they formed the small group that evolved

the whole system o f American transportation abroadthat has met every one o f the five expansions in thenumerical scope of our forces abroad .

Handicap,which was synonymous with our whole

early e ffort in France,at once took up its abode with

the D . G . o f T .

” He faced complications, both physical and temperamental

,that tried the soul

,harried the

patience and made every test o f tact , resource andingenuity. We had to haul supplies at once, so the

first trains were sent out with French cars, Frenchequipment and with an American officer in each Sec

tion .

To understand General Atterbury’ s problem , you

must know that fundamentally our whole transporta

tion system in France had to be built around our sup

ply system . General Pershing, at that historic meeting in the Rue Constantine where the A. E . F. was


born,had decided with hi s advisers that a ninety days’

reserve of supplies must be kept in France. It i s

divided into three Sections . Forty-five days must be

held at the Base port s ; thi rty days in the Intermediate

Section , and fifteen days in the Advance Section.

Thus the whole fabric of traff i c had to bend to this

all-essential end , which meant the sa fety and success

o f our cause overseas .

The difficulties that lay in the way o f swi ft Amer

ican-like operation were many. First of al l were

those four great national strategic rai lways that run

from North to South . They were laid out to expedite

troop movements to the frontier,especially the Ger

man . The American front was to be in a part o f

France which,to be accessible to us

,necessitated the

crossing of these vital arteri es . Our feat was to cross

but not to impai r them . Hence we had to dig under

or bui ld over them . So far it meant the construction

o f over 600 miles of switches,bridges

,tunnel s and

cut-off s .

This was only one Obstacle . All French trains are

switched at stations ; we do thi s job outside the sta

tions. French cars are all hand—braked and coupled ,while we use the air-brake both for coupling and stop

ping. The French current s O f traff i c , l ike the British ,use the le ft-hand track where we use the right. French

signals diff er from our own in many respects . The

only thing that the two systems had in common was

the fact that red was universal signal of danger. To

cap it all, French car control , that i s keeping track o f

S . O . S .

freight cars,as compared with our arrangements

, was

crude to say the least.

In addition, our men had to buck the French lan

guage and French customs,which was about the hard

e st j ob of all . The French railroad employé, in com

mon with hi s brother in city shop , takes two hours for

his sacred déj euner in the middle o f the day. When

our rai lroad hands came along with a dinner pail that

was literally emptied'

on the run they thought we were

savages. When we tried to get Similar action out o f

the French there was almost a riot . Thus you see

that our rai lway pioneers had some difficulties to face .

General Atterbury found that the French rai lways

were in a surpri singly good condition considering thei r

incessant usage since the beginning o f the war. What

was even more astonishing, they were capable o f stand

ing more traffic than was being put on them . But they

lacked equipment. This meant that we had to have

our own tools o f traffic. Fortunately that famous

Requi sition Number Six was already at work and the

rolling stock began to arrive . It i s al l knocked down

in America for shipment and must be erected in

France . We had to find or construct shops, and all

this took much time and more worry. But the wheels

were soon whirring and a phenomenal progress has

be en achieved . We have reached the point where we

now average the erection o f five I IO-ton locomotives

a day. Already we have Consolidation American

engines in France,and we have ordered nearly

more . In addition to these,we have acquired 240


Belgian locomotives that were run out of King Albert’ scountry when the Hun invasion began .

No less remarkable is the car erection record . OnSeptember Ist , 19 18 , we had over American carsin France, including box , flat , gondola , tank and re

f rige rator types . During the first fifteen days o f

August we averaged a dai ly erection o f 70 cars and

on one day 139 were put up and sent away on theirown wheels . The average American freight car thatwe use in France i s 30 tons capacity, while the aver

age French has only 10 tons. The American loco

motive averages 1 10 tons ; the French 60 . The draw

ing power o f our locomotives startles the French , es

pecially when our great engines haul loads o f

tons as easi ly as their engines pull 100 tons .On top of thi s e rection we have to build yards,

te rminals, sheds , switches , spurs, water tanks , S idings ,ash dumps , coal pockets— the many accessories that

go to make steam transportation possible. It hasmeant a continuous activity that touched every phaseo f transportation .

All thi s needed a vast personnel both for construetion and operation . Those pioneer Engineer regi

ments who came over at the first call for service had

to be supplemented by many thousands o f men repre

senting a varied techni cal expe rience . You get some

idea o f personnel needs when I say that to operate a

rai lway system for an army of one million men thefull working transportation complement i s exactly 63 ,

034 men , which includes 8 Stevedore regiments , 4Operating regiments , 2 Maintenance o f Way regi

88 S . O . S .

ments, 1 Maintenance of Equipment regiment and 4Car and Shop regiments. This personnel i s organi sed

in battalions by clasS ificationS , which include En

gineers, Conductors, Train Despatchers, Yard Clerks,Flagm en ,

Firemen,Boiler-Makers

,Switchmen

,Black

smiths and Boiler-Washers.Where did all the operatives come from ! Here isa little story which will tel l you how one kind of em

ployé was recru ited . During the latter part of the

summer o f 19 17 a big— boned fireman who had a regular run out of Laramie , Wyoming, heard some men

standing on the plat form mention the need o f enginedrivers for the American Army in France . This man,

whom we wil l famili arly call Roger,was one year

over the dra ft age , but that did not deter him . Hehad always wanted to go to France . He also hankeredto get into the war. Here was his opportunity: WhenRoger got back from his run he went to the nearest

recruiting station and enli sted . In the course of afew weeks he got to France

,where he was classified

as engineer. When they showed him the locomotive

that he was to drive his guffaw could have be en heardmi les away. It was one o f the l ittle Belgian engines

about the size of the tender o f the little mountainengine he had used in hi s apprenticeship . He called

it a watch-charm !It did not take Roger long to master its kinks.

The way he j erked the cars around the yards wasboth a revelation and a terror to the French . Hisfireman ,

who Shall be known as Jerry , came from

the Southern Pacific . He had seen some railroading


S . O . S .

to run through it . The result was that every native

in sight began to wave everything he could lay hands

on from flags to towels in a mad effort to stop the

American train and avert what seemed to be an in

evitable and disastrous wreck , because a passenger

train was in the block . As the French viewed it, a

miracle happened . Two hundred yards away the

American engineer started to apply hi s air-brakes and

pulled up at the station with grace and ease just at

the very spot that the French wished him to stop .

When the Gauls got their breath they were in that

state of ecstasy and acclaim that only Frenchmen can

develop over an arti st ic performance . They are stil l

talking about it .

Roger and Jerry and all their mates who have come

from practical ly every railroad in the United States

to help win the war with throttle and switch in France

had to study French methods . The way they graspe d

the complicated system i s just another evidence of

Yankee adaptabili ty which i s among the wonders of

the war. Two Books of Rules were necessary.One ,

which we shall designate A ,governs operations for

the all—American trains and i s all-Engli sh the other

Book B— i s for our employés engaged in joint opera

t ion with the French . The men in the main have

to master both .

The first contains, am ong other things, a reproduc

tionof all types of train orders, signal s, block sys

tem rules , and a dict ionary o f transportation words

and expressions ranging from engine to train regi s

ARMY TRACKS AND TRAFFIC 9 1

ters. It also sets forth the fac t that, so far as timei s concerned , the Continental System i s used .

Here we get to one of the toughest nuts that theAmerican railroad man in France has been called upon

to crack,because the French rai lway time tables use

thi s Continenta l System— that i s, ,1 to 24 o’clock .

This means that 3 o’clock in the a fternoon American

time i s 15 o’clock French rai lway time ; 1 1 pm .

American time i s 2 3 o’clock

, and so on . Thus the

veteran engineer whose orders on the Union Pacificwould have read : “Pass blank station at p m ,

”

must adapt himsel f to a Simi lar Instruction i n France

which says : “Pass blank station at o ’clock .

”

But like hi s parlez-vous-ing with the French girls, he

again gets away with it.Of course Book A i s the easiest to digest because

i t deal s with rules fam i liar to all Am erican operatives.

Book B , however, which i s printed in both Engli sh

and French— the parallel text i s on opposite pages

i s the hard one. It sets forth the regulations in effecton the Est , the Etat , the P.L .M . ( Pari s, Lyons

Mediterranean ) and the PO . ( Paris-Orleans) . These

are the four great French rai lway systems to whichI have already referred .

Dig into thi s little red Traflic Bible and you see

at once how diffi cult i s the j ob of the Yankee operatoron these French lines . Scores of our engineers arerunning French locomotives that pull full complete

French trains . Here i s an i llustration . On the Etat ,RD. and Est Railways, when the semaphore signal

i s located at a station where the train i s required

92 S . O . S .

to stop,the signal may be passed to make the neces

sary stop . On the P.L .M . there i s no exception . Thestop must be made be fore passing the signal . This

i s just one example o f what Roger and Jerry mustpack into thei r heads in order to avoid a confl ict withrules which in France i s as bad as a criminal offence .So complete i s our system . of instruction that an

American flagman sent back to warn a train in caseof a wreck or unexpected delay in traffic , carries acomplete set o f cards printed in both French and Eng

lish , setting forth the spe cific message that he mustdeliver. It all Shows that we are taking no chances

on having wrecks due either to carelessness , m isunder

standing, or lack of knowledge of the French lan

guage.The Transpo rtation Department has schools for

all ranks, and notably for the highly use ful individual

known as the Rai lway Transport Officer or the “R T.

as he is more widely called . With the Briti shhe simply acts as a first-aid to pas senger traffic , stampsrailway warrants and helps troops as they pass

through . W i th us,however

,the R .T .O . has a dual

capacity. He m ay be one o f these passenger officials,or he may also handle a full-fledged traffic j ob ata Supply Depot or a Regulating Station . At someof these places as many as five hundred cars arehandled in a single day. It i s his work to see thattrains are properly made up and sent on to their

destination . Hence the School o f Instruction mustinclude a complete course in traffic and also a good

dose of human nature . I asked a certain high trans


94 S . O . S .

paid respects to Commanding General and Chie fo f Staff and got assignment of a detai l ; checkedyard and arranged for detraining a solid train load ;at pm . arranged for billet ; pm . train arrives

,troops all out o f s tation and train gone

,

to answering fool questions,

tosupper ; Train o f troops detained and led ' tocamp ; Train o f troops detrained ; served coffeeand

‘herded’ to camp ; am . Train o f troops ditto,only worse . Have been asked more fool questions intwenty-four hours than ever be fore . Now I will sendsome telegrams and sleep al l o f two hours. It is a gaylif e .

”

Stil l another evidence of the kind o f drama thatbobs up in transportation reports i s in one

,a copy

o f which lies be fore me as I write . It i s a message

from a train despatcher up near the front who i s

ordering a certain blank form . The reason that hegives i s thi s

“Lieutenant Blank interrupted while giving report.Said bomb exploded just then . Blew in window causing candle to set sheet on fire .Behind thi s Simple statement told in bald official

fashion was a story o f sacrifice and danger that

would never figure in publi c report and never knowrecognition . The way of the railroad employé,whether in war or peace

,i s the way o f obscure but

heroic devotion .

The army o f humble yard-men , engineers , switch

men and section hands who rushed to the rai lwaycolours i s matched by the smaller but none the less

patriotic group of higher officials who are part of


the transportation fabri c in France. ! ou encounterthem everywhere . One day I saw a buck privatestanding in l ine at the mid-day mess to get hi s tin

o f“slum gull ion ,

” as the army stew i s called. Mycompanion

,an officer in the Rai lway Transportation

Corps,pointed to him and said ' “That man le ft a

ten thousand dollar a year rai lway j ob to enli st as

a private at three dollars a month . He i s now my

orderly.

” It i s not an unusual case .Run the roster o f our transportation oflicials

abroad and you will see why I called it an All-StarCast . It includes

,in addition to those I have already

mentioned , Colonel H . G . M axfield, formerly Superintendent o f Motive Power o f the Pennsylvania Railroad ; Lieutenant Colonel H . H . Adam s, who was

President o f the Kansas City Terminal Railways ;Lieutenant Colonel V . R . C . King, who was Termi

nal Superintendent of the Atlantic Coast Line ; Lieutenant Colonel Neddleton Neff , once Division Superintendent o f the Pennsylvania Lines West ; LieutenantColonel H . J . Sli fer

,former General Manager of the

Chicago Great Western ; Major F. A . Delano , one

o f the best rai lroad men in the United States,and

who le ft the Federal Reserve Board to j oin the army ;Major F. G . Robbins , former General Superintendento f the Erie ; Major G . T . Slade, who was Vice President of the Northern Pacific ; Major H . W. Hinkle ,General Superintendent Toledo

,St . Loui s Western ;

Major E . B . Cushing,General Superintendent o f the

Southern Pacific Line ; and scores of others, all con

tent to toi l at improvi sed rough board tables on occa

96 S . O . S .

sion instead of the mahogany desks over which they

once pres ided .

At the head of thi s Empire of Tracks and Trafficis General Atterbury with his hand at the throttle. So

complete and co-ordinated i s the organisation thatthere i s laid on hi s desk every morning a single type

written sheet a l ittle more than a foot Square which

sets forth— and the figures are up to the preceding

midnight— the number of ships in every port thatwe use in France ; the number o f vessels unloaded

the day‘

be fore ; the tonnage di scharged ; the numberof freight cars of all types that were unloading ; theempty cars received ; the barges shipped and the ton

nage loaded on these barges ; and a statement of

weather conditions in every port . Attached is a bri e f

re'sumé of the number of ships not being unloaded and

the reason why.

This Daily Situation,as it i s called , i s just one

more exhibit in the galle ry o f our army business e fficiency . We can now go ahead and see how i t i smade up . It means a bri ef inspe ction trip over thesystem of the Transportation Department, now one o f

the Services of Supply, which means that its Head

quarters are at Tours.In a small room on the second floor o f one of these

weather-beaten buildings i s the office of the DirectorGeneral of Transportation . On the walls are thosefamiliar blue-print charts of organisation which you

find in the room of every department head of theA .E.F. Likewise, there are charts Showing density

of traflic. I t means that with Tran spo rtation , just


S . O . S .

these various offices indicates the scope and the com

pleteness o f the all-important wing of the serv ice over

which Colonel J . A . M cCrea presides.

The operation o f hi s Car Record Bureau will show

how we have revolutioni sed transportation methods

in France . Up to the time of our advent French car

control was a sad aff air. The French had no organ

i sed or consecutive tracing of freight equipment .

Every two weeks they had a sort of checking up , but

there was no definite plan . Whole trains have been

lost for weeks. Our number of freight cars was

necessari ly limited ; like tonnage, everybody wanted

al l the cars they could get ; we had to keep them

in constan t use , and this requi red in turn that we had

to know where they were al l the time. I t meant

highly centrali sed control to prevent duplication of

orders. Here, then, i s the system :

Every car has a number which is part of

a se ries . When a car i s loaded at Base port or Supply

Depot i ts number becomes a part of the way—bi ll.

Hence forth that number is under constant sc rutiny.

At every station we have car checkers who report

the location o f empty and loaded cars each day. I f

a car i s unaccounted for twenty-four hours a tracer

i s at once started . Every morning there is laid on

the General Manager’ s desk a large sheet which con

tains, by stations , a report of cars delayed in excess

o f twenty-four hours . It not only indicates the type

of car and its freight,i f loaded

,but the specific cause

of the delay. Thus congestion can be relieved at once.


All our cars are marked : Return When Empty toPort .” This injunction has helped a great deal .You can see the Master Car Situation on file each

day in Colonel M cCrea’

s Office , which tells the whole

story of why, out of American cars handled inone interval , only 1 2 were missing on the whole

L ines o f Communication . Technically it i s called“Report of Car Situation

,Movement and Supply for

Twenty-four Hour Period Ending Twenty-four

O’

Clock.

” It i s a complete analysi s of every car,empty and loaded

,handled at every station on our

system during the preceding twenty-four hours. On

it you can see such items as the analysis o f freights ;the physical condition o f the rolling stock (which i sa most important fact to know ) ; the loading work

done by the various departments ; indeed , every con

ceivable detai l that contributes to the upkeep and

operation o f the freight cars that we had inFrance at the time I write . These daily records are

sent in each day by telegraph . In the Uni ted Statesit i s done by mail .

In addition to all this every freight train i s checkedup and its record put on a card which contains thenumber of the train and the number o f each car init ; the French road it travels on ; the consignee ; pointo f shipment ; destination ; and contents . On the card

i s also a list of every important station that it mustpass. The train i s checked up as i t passes each station and the hour of the passing i s recorded . Whenthe trip i s fini shed there i s a complete biography o f

the j ourney. This card i s kept for ninety days in

S . O . S .

order to check up any questions that may arise inconnection with the trip . A fter ninety days i t i sofficially “dead” and i s destroyed .

In the movement of troop trains you get a touchof dramatic interest. Here, and up to the zone o f

fighting, the controlling factor i s our old friend G4,which i s advised by cable by the Navy Departmentof the impending arrival o f the convoys. G4 then ,and at the direction o f instructs the TroopMovement Bureau where the troops are to be shippe d .

They may go into a billeting area or to barracksfor rest and intensive training . A so-called Landing

Officer accompanies each troop t rain from port to

destination . Only a Blotter Record i s kept of the

movement of troop trains,for no permanent records

are necessary .

It i s not unti l our troop s st rike a French train

we use French cars for thi s transportation— that they

reali se the hardships of war. Our soldiers are car

ried on what the American would call a freight boxcar, labelled in France

“

40 hommes e t 8 Cher/oux,

”

which means “

40 men and 8 horses.” In trying to

decipher this war-worn phrase many an American

private has got his first real lesson in French . After

he has travelled on the cars he begins to sympathise

with the “8 Cher/aux.

”

The completeness o f organi sation which marks the

General Manager’ s activiti es i s equally true in the do

main o f the Business Manager. Colonel Bunting op

crates in preci sely the same way he Ope rated in his of

fice in the Broad Street Station in Philadelphia . He


be rths at Marsei l les ; Maintenance of Way material ;Additional tracks at Montoi r yards ; Car movements ;Plans for opening port at Cette ; Facilities requi red at

ports ; Tugs from the United States ; Development of

yards at St . Sulpice ; Return of steel rails to French .

Everything i s threshed out ; there i s no duplication . It

all makes for team-work .

Search through the whole Transportation Depart

ment and you find every detail that goes to make upa well-operated system . The “Safety First” rules are

typical . They grew out of the many fatal accidents

to our soldi ers through carelessness on trains. One

hundred and twenty-seven American soldi ers havebeen ki lled while riding on the tops and sides of rai l

way cars . Hence you find al l cars used by our troops

placarded with as picturesque a set o f warnings as

was ever handed out for the sa feguarding of human

beings.One o f them reads like thi s“Your head may be hard , but not as hard as bridges

and tunnel arches . Only six inches clearance between

tops and sides of cars and tunnel arches and bridges .

Don’ t ride on tops or sides o f car s . The rai lwaycompany wil l hold you responsible for damages to

bridges and tunnel s and signal towers . They are not

insured . Keep your block inside .

”

A second runs : “There are three kinds o f foo l sI . Fools ; 2 . Damned Fools ; 3 . Soldiers who ride on

tops and sides of cars I f you expect to see the next

block keep yours inside .

A third warning says : Huns are wai ting in the

ARMY TRACKS AND TRAFFIC 1 9 3

trenches ahead . Speed up . ! ou won’ t i f you ride

on top or stick your head outside o f cars . Keep your

ivory in .

”

Still another one i s : War Ri sk Insurance : Keep

inside ; don’ t be a dead one ; help to win the war.

I f you want one final evidence o f the thoroughness

of our transportation system , I have only to add the

story of the so-cal led “Ameri can Special” — a near de

luxe passenger train that runs for the exclusive use

of American officers every night , each way, between

the Fighting Headquarters and the Supply Headquar

ters . Everything on it i s American except the coaches ,and they happen to be the pick of the best first-class

cars in Fran ce . When thi s train i s about to start

the passenger hears : “All Aboard” i n just the same

vernacular, dialect and all , that he hears at the Grand

Central Station in New York,the Broad Street S ta

tion in Philadelphia,and the Old South Station in

Boston . As he approaches the car negro porters, inkhaki instead o f the familiar blue un i form and brass

buttons , separate him from his baggage just as theydo in the States. The best thing about i t i s that

these darkies are rea l Pullman porters . Every one

o f them has had hi s share o f rai lroading back home.He is a never-ending source of wonder to the French

porter, who marvels at the dexterity he shows in

making up beds for the night. One distinctive differ

ence between dealing with these army po rters and the

porters in Ameri ca i s that the black boys on the“American Spec ial” do not have thei r hands out for

the customary tip which i s such a necessary part of

S . O . S .

Ameri can travel . Yet thei r service i s just as cheer ful

and just as good . The tipless porter therefore i s one

of the rare exhibits of the war !

When the “American Special idea was launchedthe purveying o f porters became a problem . Where

were they to come from ! I f there was any place,that place was surely the Stevedore regiments. Dis

crect inquiries were at once made , but the word soonpercolated down the black and brown ranks thatmen who had had experience as Pullman porters were

wanted . The response was astounding. Nearly everystevedore in France claimed to have had long and

var ied training in the Pullman service . They had

visions of warm cars and easy work . A certain top

sergeant was known to have been a porter veteran ,

and to him was delegated the task of picking out

the twenty men needed . He was not to be foo led .

The net result i s a porter service that i s one hundred

per cent good . There i s never a tri p but that thesesoldier-porters recognise some one from whom they

have collected quarters,hal f dollars and even dollars

at the end of long runs in Ameri ca.


S . O . S .

been on the j ob ever since. He has seen that in fantorganisation o f four hundred negro stevedores and

twenty foremen,known as the Transport Battalion ,

expand into the army of labourers that he now com

mands. This work was originally part o f the Quarter

master Corps,but was transferred to its logical do

main,which i s Transportation .

When our suppl i es began to pi le into France the

word went forth from Headquarters : “Keep the

docks clear. Congested docks not only meant an

interrupted flow of supplies all the way up to thefront , but what was equally important, delay in the“turn around” of ships , and Ships in this war are

L i fe . Hence the j ob o f the A .T .S . i s to unload ships

as swi ftly as possible and keep the docks ever ready

to take on the unending stream of stuff that flowsfrom America into France . How i s i t done !As soon as a ship sa il s from the United States

the Navy Department notifies the A .T .S . When that

ship is i n Mid-Atlantic i t sends a further advice statingthe draught and size of the vessel and the cargo

in detail. I f i t i s a transport i t sends the numbe ro f troops and thei r classification . This informationnow forms the basi s o f operations. The A .T .S . must

adapt the ship to one o f the fourteen destinati ons

that we have in Europe . This assignment i s gove rned in turn by the rai l t ransport out o f the port ;whether that port i s congested or free ; by the draughtand size o f the ship ; the class of cargo ( i f i t i s ex

plosive it must go to an i solated place ) and also the

speci al type of cargo. I f the ship i s carrying loco

FROM SHIP TO SHORE 107

motives it must go to a port which has monster cranes.

In the case of a troopship , the final destination of thesoldiers o ften helps to determine the port . Thus,be fore the ship reaches France

,the A .T .S . has as

signed it to a port best equipped to handle its freight .By the time i t i s be rthed the exact number of steve

dores, machinery, and trucks are ready to empty its

deck and burrow into its hold . Now you see why

there i s no delay and why we have been able to handle

tons a day.

An adequate Intell igence System is a v ital factor.Between 1 2 and 2 o ’clock every day Colonel Moore

gets a long-di stance telephone cal l from the A .T .S .

Supe rintendent at every one o f the eleven ports we

used in France , and they range from Belgium to Italy.

This report i s a compact summ ary of weather and

dock conditions. Weather i s of course an all-import

ant matter . If there are any usual events l ike acci

dents or wrecks they are al l reported . Hence the

Chief o f the Army Transport Service i s not only inconstant touch with the si tuation , but he can constantly in form the whole A . E . F . about many things

they want to know . I f the Air Serv ice,for example

,

calls up and asks : “When can we have some aero

planes ! ” all that the officer at A . T . S . Headquarters

has to do is to look up a Sheet recording advices o fincom ing Ships and he can at once say :

“S ierra will

arrive at Bordeaux to morrow morning with a thousand tons of aeroplanes set up .

”

I f you want to know just how the A . T. S . works,come with me on a li ttle tr ip to Base S ection Number

108 S . O . S .

One . Here you will find the Superintendent o f theA .T .S . installed in an office at the dock , where he

can see the ships that he must work,hear the creak

of crane and the rattle of truck . In thi s particular

case the Superintendent is Lieutenant Colonel F. W.

Green,Short

,stocky

,alert , and a dynamo of energy.

He le ft the Genera l Managership o f the Loui siana andArkansas Railway to do hi s share in France. He runs

that port just as easily as he once operated

miles of rai lway back home . In hi s pocket i s a loose

lea f memorandum book on which is typed the name,length

,draught

,the heaviest package aboard and the

itemised cargo of every ship that he must unload .

He has gotten these facts by wire from the Directorof the A .T .S . Part o f hi s task

,there fore

,i s to

arrange for a suitable be rth for the ship . He must

have a crane or derrick for that heaviest package

i f i t i s an engine or a steel girder .On a large black-board be fore him i s a diagram

of the lock basins . Each be rth has a number. Along

side each number i s written in chalk the name of

the ship unloading there. Thus he can see at aglance just what is going on in hi s bai liwick . As

soon as the ship i s unloaded its name i s wiped out

and another i s written in .

In addition there i s a black-board in the office o f

the Assistan t Superintendent, which i s a sort of working register. This deals with the concrete detail s ofunloading. It contains the number o f the berth, the

name of the ship alongside, the unloading offi cer in

charge , the number o f hatches working, the number


1 10 S . O . S .

a pound strays oi: gets lost in the tumultuous shuffle.

There i s a checker on the boat and one ashore . Fre

quently, and notably in the case o f ration components,the goods go direct from ship to freight car which

stands on a siding at the dock . This saves rehandlingin the warehouse . This process , technically called D i s

position,means that the cargo goe s direct to consumer,

which i s the army, withou’

t storage. Where there i s

an exceptionally large consignment for one Serv i ce a

representative of that Service i s at the dock to see

that i t i s sent at once to its proper destination . This

i s especially true o f motor transpo rtation and Quar

termaster stores . Motor trucks and cars are made

up in trains and sent at once to the Reception Parks

which are always near the quays . The whole rule

o f supply in France i s to get the stu ff from where i t

i s plenti ful to where i t i s needed and with the min

imum amount o f labour.All thi s many-sided and unending dock eff ort i s put

down on paper. On what i s known as the Dai lyReport o f Dock and Shed Operations you can see the

location of the work , the tonnage unloaded from the

boat, whether i t went di rect to cars or to trucks and

barges, or was left on the dock ; the total tonnagehandled in terms of troops

,animals and material s ; the

number of man hours used up in handling the freight

and the average tonnage per man per hour. Likewise,and in a no less comprehensive document entitled Dai lyReport o f Boat Operations

, you can read every night

the complete record o f what was done with every

boat on which labour was employed . ! ou get first

FROM SHIP TO SHORE 1 1 1

of all the nam e of the boat ; the port from which itsai led

,the time o f i ts arrival outside and the t ime o f

i ts docking, i ts draught, number o f cargo hatches , the

exact cargo aboard both In specific i tems and tonnage,and the whole unloading record . In addition you get

its complete Outward Movement, the ballast employed

and whether i t took back to America any troops or

passengers. Even the state o f weather during the

Ship ’ s stay in France i s part o f thi s remarkable

chronicle . When you have fini shed reading one o f

these reports you know the complete history of that

ship and its cargo from the time it le ft the port“Somewhere in Ameri ca” unti l i t sai led back fromSomewhere in France .”

But thi s i s not all. That great mass of freight

must be transferred to car and barge . Hence therei s a Dai ly Report of Car and Barge Movement

,which

specifies the exact numbe r o f freight cars or bargesloaded and the specific freight together with the desti

nation . The work o f the A .T .S . so far as the actual

tonnage i s concerned ends when men and material go

speeding inland-ward . Once outside the Port Areathe rai lway or canal servi ce authority begins.Apropos o f thi s canal se rvice let me say that herei s a branch o f Transportation that grows steadily in

importance and use fulness. On its four hundred milesof water-ways we have more than 600 men afloat

in charge o f tow-boat captains who have come from

American canal s that range from the Eri e to the Panama project . Evidence of the approaching magnitudeo f the Serv ice i s the fact that fifty concrete oil-burning

S .

tow-boats are under construction for the A .T .S . in

France . Fi fteen ocean-going tugs crossed the Atlantic

to join i ts fleet .

Buried in the formal records o f the Army Trans

port Serv ice are many dramas in achievem ent— ro

manees of heroi c e ff ort that are as kindling as any

narrative of fighting at the front . They are shot

through with the thri l l o f combat with wind and rain

and circumstance . Let me disclose two o f them that

will make every American fee l just a little prouder o f

hi s national kinship with the m en,white and black ,

who made them possible .

One day a great fleet of troop transports— in reality

two convoys — carrying over forty thousand men ap

peared outside Brest . The port had a normal de

barking capacity, with camp accommod ation ashore,o f thi rty thousand men a month . I t was in the early

days. There were no docks ; the soldiers had to be

lightered .

“Can you unload these men in ten days ! ”

was the proposition put up to the Superintendent of

the A .T .S . In exactly forty-eight hours a fterwards

every man was walking the soi l o f France . Colonel

Green , the l ive wire now in charge at Base Section

Number One, i s the man who turned the trick . He

did it— for one thing— by making a bridge of a flo

ti lla of French ships in the harbour. He even com

mandeered tugs, barges, anything afloat that would

carry a human being. That enormous convoy did not

find camps and kitchens ready for them when they

set foot in France , but they got off their ships in less


S . O . S .

port under ideal conditions . Such achievements asthese, and they are merely typical , are Simply part of

the day’ s work of the Army Transport Service .Thi s World o f Tracks and Traffic which pulses

with movement must be linked with swi ft communi

cations . At thi s po int we touch the Signal Corpswhich has a leading part in the whole vast scheme of

our eff ort in France . Its telephone and telegraph

lines not only bind up the Serv ices of Supply but reachto the observation posts that look out on

“No Man ’ s

Land .

” There i s seldom a list o f awards of the

American Distinguished Service Cross without a cita

tion o f some signaller who crept out under fire to

repair a wi re or who kept hi s telephone working un

der a hell o f shells .Wi th the Signal Corps you are face to face with

what amounts to a large cross section o f the American

Telephone Telegraph Company planted overseas .

! ou see telegraph rooms that rattle l ike machine guns

and wi th multiplex systems that send eight telegrams

at one time over the same wire ; you find yoursel f incomplete telephone exchanges operated by nimble

witted American gi rls. Over the five —hundred mile

lengt h o f our service we send what amounts to 90,

000 ordinary telegraph messages a day, which i s equal

to the commercial telegraph business done dai ly in a

city the size o f Philadelphia . In one place— Tours

we duplicate the business that Baltimore does everytwenty-four hours . We register more than

long distance telephone calls a day or as many as

are put in each day between‘

New York and Boston .

FROM SHIP TO SHORE 1 15

In addition there are 400 long distance calls a day on

our leased wi res. To do al l thi s we use milesof American strung wire . We also lease miles

o f French wire , which makes a total of miles

o f wire owned or controlled by the American Expe

ditionary Force.At the head o f thi s net-work of nerves is a smooth

faced , grey-hai red man , Brigadier General Edgar Rus

sel, who was in at the birth o f the system in France.

As in every other activity, Signal s faced many oh

stacle s. The European apparatus does not fully meet

the needs o f the American Engineers . The French

telephone , as every traveller knows , i s one of the pen

ances o f modern times . Try to get a cal l i n Paris

it i s much worse in the provinces — and you atonefor all your sins. We had to bring ove r everything

we used but the poles and we had trouble in gettingthem .

The American Telegraph Battalions who vi e withthe Transportation Corps in versati lity and sacrifice

,

have become a fam i liar sight in rural France as they

sit astride pole s or dash up and down the roads in

their emergency wagons . We have a complete system of pole patrol because these wires must be up

and doing all the time . Every Ameri can pole is numbered and branded “U . S . A . It gives you a friendly

feeling to see the unending procession of them as youmotor along the highways .The really fascinating detail

,however ( thi s ad

jective is not without its literal meaning) , of the Sig

nal Corps i s the human Side . I mean of course that

S . O . S .

gal lant band of nearly two hundred American women

who operate the switchboards and who have displayeda courage that has had more than one actual test. Onenight when Paris was under a rain of ai r bombs and

when men rushed to sa fety, the American telephone

girls on duty were asked to leave thei r posts and seekthe “

abri,” which is the official “Shelter.” Just then

a wmdow in the room was smashed by a shell frag

ment,yet those hello heroines remained at the switch

board .

“We will stay unti l the last man leaves,” they

said . Thi s i s the fibre o f the enlisted si sters of our

fighting men .

They are a hand-picked crowd with as fine a senseo f serv ice as ever animated combat troops . For theoriginal contingent the two main qualifications werea knowledge o f French and telephone Operation . That

was when we had to use French wires . With our com

plete all-American system now the French requirementi s incidental . Thos e pioneer operators had to be trained

in the United States . The majority o f them were col

lege gi rl s,keen of mind and with an immense capacity

for work . Go to any one o f our switchboards in

France and you can see a Wellesley graduate seatedalongside a girl who has had to make her way fromchildhood . In thi s serv ice, l ike the

“Colonel ’ s ladyand Judy O

’

Grady,” they are all patriots “under the

skin .

”

The telephone Operators wear a smart blue uni formwith a blue aviator cap . On the left Sleeve i s a whitebrassard indicating position . The operator’ s badge

bears a telephone transmitter the supervi sor’ s, a trans


1 18 S . O . S .

we have a completely equipped Research Service in

stal led in a laboratory in Pari s, where already our

scientific experts under the stress o f emergency have

improved telephony and telegraphy. Such is the as

tonishing function o f a l ittle-known but all-essential

branch o f the Services of Supply.

Like Transportation,the Signals Corps has drawn

the Stars o f Communication to i ts ranks . In the tele

phone exchange at Tours one day I saw a slight grey

haired man in khaki and who wore the silver eagle o f

a full Colonel on hi s shoulders . When I met him a

little later I found that he was Colonel John J . Carty,the greatest o f al l l iving telephone engineers and the

man who,almost more than any other, made it pos

sible for New York to speak to San Francisco. He

i s on the job in France , which means that our tele

phone service i s as scientifically superv i sed as that

of Chicago or St . Loui s.Thus Rails

,Sails and Wires combine in the crea

tion of an Aid to Wa r that represents the last word

in efficiency and servi ce . The mark o f America i s all

over it.

V — F eeding the D oughboys

N an office on the second floor o f the historic bar

racks bui lding at Tours which houses the Head

quarters oi the Services o f Supply of the Amer

ican Expeditionary Force sits a broad-shoudered,rangy man with keen brown eyes, firm j aw

,and every

external evidence o f a distinct and dominating personality . From his desk which faces the crossed flagso f the Quartermaster Corps that hang over the door

,

radiates the authori ty that means victory or de feat forour overseas troops . Without him there can be no

flaming offensive . With him all progress i s possible .He is Maj or General Harry L . Rogers , Quarter

master General to the whole American army and Chief

Quartermaster of the Pershing host . Through himyour son, brother, husband or sweetheart

,whether

he is in Base port or at the battle front,never misses

a meal , and i s always shod and clothed .

The moment you reach the Quartermaster Corps

you invade the Master Domain o f the Business of

War. Guns can wait but hunger cannot . Upon it

well-fed man can always fight . An army i s only asefficient and as eff ective as its subsistence system

,and

i t i s as true to day as it was when men hurled spearsand shot arrows.

S . O . S .

No corresponding officer in any of the Alli ed armieshas so ram ified a task as General Rogers . Stewardship O f the so ldier’s stomach is only one o f his obliga

tions. You get some idea of the scope o f his labours

when I tell you that the blue-print chart of hi s organisation in France alone i s eight feet long and has

more than a hundred Sections , each one indicating a

separate activity. Under his control everywhere i s

an army greater than the entire regular establishment

o f the United States when we went to war with

Germany. He i s the keeper of more than three square

miles o f warehouses in France from which flow un

ceasing streams o f sustenance . At hi s direction the

largest ice making plant under one roof in the world

has been bui lt . He operates farms and factories while

his salvage ranges from the repair o f a Shoe to therestoration o f a sawmill . In fuelling the fighting fur

nace he has expanded industry and redeemed communities at home and abroad . The figures with whichhe deals are so staggering that they need to be splashed

on a ten-league canvas with those proverbial brushes

o f comet’ s hair.His principality i s geared up to the whole Universe

o f Output . The Old World and the New alike lubri

cate the endless chain o f army supply that must never

break a l ink . In every subsequent chapter o f this book

you will encounter some contact or dependence uponhis far-flung functions. Chief among his responsibilities, however, i s Subsistence . It i s with the re

sponse that he makes to the most incessant of all demands— the human appetite— that this narrative is


FEEDING THE DOUGHBOYS

mainly concerned . Again you have the revelation of

a monster merchandising,driven by a titanic energy,

harnessed to needs and wants that never cease . Once

more you find the emergency met.The Quartermaster Corps , which i s the prototype

o f the Army Service Corps in the Briti sh Army, was

in at the birth o f the A .E .F. Like mothers’ milk

it begins with li fe for it i s the means preservative o farmy existence . Originally the present organi sation

was operated by three separate bod ies : the Pay De

partm ent which paid the troops ; the Commissary

which dealt wi th food ; and the Quartermaster who

provided clothing and tentage . Long be fore we went

to grips with the Kaiser,however

,they were unified

under one head— a Quartermaster General , and in one

body which was called the Quartermaste r Corps.Hence the Quartermaster General of the army— the

— i s l ike the head o f a corporation composed o f many merged subsidiaries .When General Pershing sai led for France in June,

19 17, he took with him Colonel Dani el E . M cCarthy,

who was the First Chie f Quartermaster o f the A .E.P.

W ith him went five assistants and also ten other

Quartermaster Officers with a group of enli sted sol

diers and clerks . This handful of subordinate officers

and men , many of them now r1sen high in the Serv ice,formed the nucleus of the tens o f thousands who succour and sustain the Expedition to-day.

Like every other Serv ice,the as the

Quartermaster Corps i s termed , had humble begin

ning. Its first offices were two rooms, twenty by

S . O . S .

twenty feet square , in that historic bui lding in the RueConstantine in Pari s where our whole overseas eff ort

first saw the light o f day. The tiny quarters were

flooded at the sta rt with every conceivable kind of

commerci al off ering that ranged from hand grenadesand tenni s rackets to whole bakeries and founderies.

There was a constant influx o f inventors,spies

,sales

men,advisers

,business “expe rts” and stranded Amer

icans al l dripping with suggestions and ideas and

eager to get thei r fingers into Uncle Sam ’ s purse .This i tch for easy Government money

,I might add

,

sti ll exists. It knows neither rank nor caste.In those early and precarious days General Persh

ing realised that the great bulk o f his supplies would

have to be brought from America . Thus our wholevast tonnage problem really began with food and i t

has remained the first and forem ost consideration o f

shipping ever since .In July

,19 17, and in one o f the first orders i ssued

by the A .E.F. the duties of the Chie f Qua rtermaster

were published as : Transportation o f Personnel andSupplies ; Supply Transportation and Repai rs ; Cloth

ing ; Quarterm aster Equipment ; Subsistence ; Fuel ;Forage ; Lights ; Quarters ; Camp Sites ; Quarters andOffices ; Pay of Personnel and General Disbursements ;Laundries and Baths ; Remounts ; Claims ; Salvage ;Workshops and Storehouses ; Cemeteries ; Burials ;Graves Regi stration ; Labour and Quartermaster Per

sonnel. With the exception o f Claims and Transpor

taf ion these duties remain practica lly the same to-day.

Part of Colonel M cCarthy’s force arranged for


S . O . S .

Subsequently he became Qua rtermaster General to all

our forces . Colonel M cCarthy had to return home

because o f i llness .It was Brigadier General Rogers ( hi s great work

on the border had won him promotion ) who face d the

task of organising the Quartermaster’ s work in

France. To write of those early times i s to begin theusual catalogue o f difficulties and handicaps. There

was shortage o f personnel , tonnage and motor trans

port. Besides,no one knew just how large our over

seas force would be . It i s interesting to reflect that

at the outset our coal needs,for example, were con

sidered at tons a month . To—day we use

nearly ten times that much .

Responsibi lities literal ly buzzed around the head

o f the new Chie f Quartermaster. With uncanny fore

sight he anticipated many emergencies . For one thing

he saw that he would have to purchase as many sup

plies as possible abroad in order to save tonnage.

Out o f thi s vision grew the invaluable GeneralPurchasing Board o f which you will hear more in a

later chapter. It was put up to the Chie f Quartermaster

, O r the as he i s familiarly call ed ,to locate and equip the General Headquarters o f theA .B.E. and which were Opened on Septembe r 1 st , 19 17,at Chaumont , a little town in the North that wi ll be forever famous. Here , and almost within stone throw

from General Pershing’ s ofl‘ice , General Rogers set upshop with five assi stants. From thi s has grown his

overseas supply army which now numbers more thanofficers and men

,all bound by a sense of

FEEDING THE DOUGHBOYS 12 5

loyalty and se rvice which reflect the character andpurpose o f the man at the head .

There is no space he re to tell the story o f the marvellons expansion o f the Supply Service . The first

Quartermaster Depot in that one-time fishing vi llage

where the Ameri can flag was planted in France was

the lone outpost o f the continuous bulwark o f food and

equipment that now stretches more than four hundred

miles from the sea to the front . Whether these De

pots feed five hundred men or five hundred thousand

the system i s just the same . Three times a day in

fair weather or foul,in battle lull or amid the hai l

o f lead,the dough-boy literally gets the dough - and

a great deal more . We have capitali sed every expe

rience of the Briti sh and have added some trimmings

in the bargain .

To day the office o f the Chie f Quarterm aster atTours i s precisely like the office o f the President andGeneral Manager of the greatest Distributing Corpo

ration in the world . On hi s wall hangs that eight

foot super-blueprint which outlines the organ isation.

At the apex i s General Rogers . Immediately under

him is the Deputy Chie f Quartermaster,Brigadier Gen

eral J . M . Carson , who is his understudy. Linked upwith the Chie f Quartermas ter are three as sistants,Brigadier General J . F. Madden , Colonel A . K . Bas

kette and Lieutenant Colonel J . P . Castleman . They

do just what the assistants to the head o f a commercial concern do . Supporting the Deputy Chie f Quar

term aster is the Chie f of the Inspe ction Division ,Colonel M . J . Henry. ! ou must understand that it is

12 6 S . O . S .

only through constant inspection that these wheels of

supply are kept moving . In this group you have what

would correspond to the principal executive heads o fa huge Supply Corporation .

Extending from thi s group are the myriad l ines

that l ink up the various Divisions . Fi rst and fore

most comes Supplies,which means subsistence of al l

kinds — fuel,forage

,clothing, vehicles , warehousing,

gardens ( for we raise our own vegetables) and coldstorage . The other Divisions are : Salvage ; Remounts ; Accounting ; Finance ; Personnel ; Adm inistration ; Construction and Repai r ; and

,final service

in the l i fe o f the soldier— Graves Regi stration . With

the exception of thi s last-mentioned Section you have

the complete working units o f a well-kni t commercial institution that deals in food

,transport

,garden

truck , and doe s considerable manu facturing on theside . The Heads o f these Divi sions are like the di

rectors o f a corporation ( they are a Supply Di rectorate ) and S it in with the Chie f Quartermaster and hisDeputy at dai ly or called con ferences which are precisely l ike the sessions o f the Board of Directors ofthe United States Steel Corporation or the International Harvester Company. Every Division knowswhat the other i s doing ; each Head profits by the ex

perience o f his colleague ; their united eff ort spells thesuccess of the extraordinary institution

,-which fur

nishes the mainstay of the American ExpeditionaryForce.Now let us take a swi ft survey of the Lines of Sup

ply. ! ou can see them on the huge M ap o f Distribué


S . O . S .

days’ reserve of food for our whole overseas force

and all these subs i stence eggs must not be stored in

one basket . In addition , the enemy infests the air,and there i s always the danger o f raids in some quar

ters . To cap all thi s i s the incessant flood of sup

plies that i s arriving in France at the rate of tens of

thousands of tons a day. There must be no conges

tion at the ports . Hence there was devi sed a system

which scatters the storage and provides for a chaino f huge Supply Depots that begins at the Base and

extends far up into the Advanced Section .

The Depots at the ports are called Base Supply

Depots where a forty-five days’ supply is kept . Hal f

way between sea and front are the Intermediate Supply Depots which house a thi rty days’ supply, while

those sti ll nearer the zones o f the armies are tech

nically known as Advanced Supply Depots bui lt to

hold fi fteen days’ rations for the overseas forces.

Each one o f these insti tutions i s a full-fledged Cityof Supply with acres and acres o f close d and Open

storage ; thousands o f employés, with receiving, de

parture and classification railway yards ; with water

works System,

fire department,police force — indeed

every detai l o f a sel f— contained orderly and thrivingcommunity. I f you want one sti rring ev idence ofAmerican foresight and enterpri se abroad just go to

one of these Capitals o f Subsistence and you will see

sections of New York , Chicago, Detroit and“other

points West all rolled into one dynamic centre of

l i fe and action . Thi s chain of Supply Depots i s linked

up with hundreds o f miles of rai lroad over which an

FEEDING THE DOUGHBOYS 129

almost unending procession of American Supply trains

made up of American cars, hauled by American en

gines and operated by American crews, travel day and

night.Before we dissect the vast body through which

flows the li fe-blood of our overseas armies we must

first find out what constitutes the l i fe-giving suste

nance . In other words,what does the doughboy eat !

Here we get to the one war subject of supreme and

universal interest. Everybody eats ; every one has

some fri end or relative in France ; there fore he i s con

cerned about his fare and wel fare . The diet sheeto f the soldier i s as important as the annal o f an ad

vance and is infinitely more regular.In the last three years I have eaten in the messe s

of the American,British

,French

,Ital ian

,Belgian and

Russian armies . Out o f all thi s experience I am free

to confess that no soldier ( I cannot o f course Speako f the war-time German commissary ) is better fedthan ours . With the possible exception of the British Tommy none gets such quantity and variety. I

have had griddle cakes wi th syrup at an enli sted men’ s

mess at a Base port , while at officers’ table s in the

field I have had apple p ie,white rolls

,biscuits and

corn bread , al l piping hot, that were as palatable as

any I ever had in America and all made out o f the

regulation ration issue. ! ou can only reali se the

miracles that a good cook can work with tinned beefwhen you try some of the many kinds o f stew thatemerge from the ordinary travelling ki tchen often

bricked up in an open field . Uncle Sam believes wi th

130 S . O . S .

von Moltke that no army food i s too expensive . As

a m atter of fact, good food i s a good investm ent, inwar as in peace.The so-called ration i s the amount of food that asoldier eats every day. In the American army the

various articles such as bread , meat , salt, butter andlard that go to make up thi s ration are technically

known as the components. Thi s rati on has been scien

tifically worked out by the best food experts. As far

as the A .E.P. i s concerned it i s based on all our previon s army experience in many climates and has also

had the added value o f the investigations o f the Rock

e feller Institute. Thus the food that i s served everyday

,rain or shine

,in France i s ample fuel for the

machine that works and fights .As in the Briti sh army

,we have di ff erent kinds of

rations to meet certain needs . The standard ration,however

,i s the so-called Garri son Ration . The prin

cipal components are fresh bee f , flour,beans , pota

toe s,prunes

,coff ee

,sugar, evaporated or condensed

milk,vinegar

,salt

,pepper, cinnamon , lard, butter,

syrup,baking powder and flavouring extract. These

major articles are issued in given quantities for each

man . It i s up to the mess sergean t and the cook todo the rest . I f the mess sergeant i s enterpri sing andthe cook resource ful these articles may be convertedinto three very satis factory meal s, including hot cakes

and syrup at breakfast, pic at dinner and ice cream

at night .These components

,however

,are what might be

called the stand-bys . The Quartermaster provides a


S . O . S .

darkies have acqui red an ardent i f expensive taste

for French melons .The doughboy i s a carnivorous animal . For him

there are no meatless days . His fresh or frozen bee fallowance there fore , or i ts equivalent in mutton , i stwenty ounces a day

,which i s four ounces more than

the allowance of the British soldier. I t i s the largestknown army meat ration .

Every month some new feature i s added to the sol

dier’s ration . Thanks to General Rogers an ounce of

bar chocolate i s now a ration component . Formerly

the on ly chocolate procurable was through purchase

at the Commissary Stores . During the past fi fteen

years the efficacy of chocolate as a fighting man ’ s food

has been amply demonstrated . It began in the Russo

Japanese War when the little brown men scientifically

Showed that i t is,in many respects , the most compact

and sustaining o f all emergency rations. As most

people know , when men eat candy they have little

desire for liquor. The man on the water wagon nat

urally takes to sweets . A candy famine in France

there fore works almost as much hardship as a short

age of meat.Another new feature i s macaroni , which is not onlynourishing but when mixed with cheese

,which i s stil l

another new component,i s most sustaining. When

macaroni was first introduced the men said instinctively :

“Do you think that we are a bunch of‘da

goe s’ As soon as they found out how good it wasthey changed thei r tune . Now they almost cry

.for i t.

Stil l a fourth innovation in the matter of ration


i ssue i s an allowance o f four ounces of smoking to

bacco with cigarette paper or an equivalent in ciga

rettes . This boon for the Yankee fighting man is thedirect result o f an order from the Commander-in

Chie f , who does not himsel f smoke !The Garri son Ration i s increa sed for the troops

in the front line trenches from November to March ,inclusive . The meat al lowance i s expanded by five

ounces ; coffee and sugar by an ounce each . The man

under fire also gets fifty per cent increase in candles

and matches . The French winter with its intense cold

and incessant rain makes this increase in stomach

stoking necessary.

Of course bread i s an i ll-important i tem . Our men

get the very best fresh white bread available. I t i s

supplied to troop s on the Lines o f Communication andin the field with equal ease and quality. The field

bread i s in ten and twelve pound loaves and goes upto the troops in jute sacks forty-eight hours a fter i t

has le ft the oven. We have a string of hand-operated

and mechanical bakeries that extends from the portsup to the zone o f the armies and where every poundo f the pounds o f bread that we consume

every day in France i s baked . One o f these mechanical bakeries has a dai ly capacity o f poundsof bread ; another turns out The empty flour

sacks are sent up to the front and used for sand bags.There i s an allowance o f one pound of bread a dayfor each man . I f he gets tired of thi s variety hecan get hard bread which we produce in immense

quanti ties. This hard bread i s a much better variety

134 S . O . S .

than the famous hard tack which was one of the

prize tooth and digestion destroyers in the world . It

i s excellent and when soaked in coff ee is most desi r

The components o f the Garrison Ration lend them

selves to much manipulation . Here i s a sample aver

age daily menu of troops on the Lines o f Communica

tion : for break fast there was coff ee or tea,fresh white

bread , ham and j am ; for dinner, as the midday meal

i s called , there was roast-bee f , potatoes , canned toma

toes,fresh white bread

,butter and a dessert composed

o f stewed apples and rai sins ; at supper the men had

be e f stew,white bread and French toast and syrup .

This i s typical fare and i t i s served with abundant

variation whether the doughboy i s behind the . l ines,in camp or barracks : travelling on a troop train , or

up in the trenches . With the American army larder

there i s no such phrase as “no more .” Every man

gets as much as he wants . I have seen mess tins

brought up three times in rapid succession be fore the

ravenings o f a soldier’s hunger were appe ased .

The so-called Field Ration i s a more or less emergeney or campaign ration consisting o f bacon or

canned meat,hard bread

,beans, potatoe s, dri ed fruit

or j am,sugar

,milk

,salt and pepper. The Reserve

Ration,which in some respects corresponds with the

Iron Ration that the British Tommy carries in his

haversack all the t1me In case o f a breakdown in foodtransport

,consists of bacon or canned meat, hard

bread,coffee

,sugar and salt . Our men must keep

this on thei r persons when in the field . Still another


S . O . S .

cipal components are rice, bread and vegetables,mainly turnips ; while the Ital ians, French, Spaniards

and Greeks get bread , meat , macaroni , vegetables, eoffee and a dai ly allowance of hal f a l itre of red wine.This wine i s as necessary a part o f the daily food

issue of the Latin soldier as bread or meat.Although we are feeding more than a million and

a hal f men in France there i s no cook problem . That

ancient adage, God sends the meat but the devi l sends

the cook ,” has no echo in the A .E .F. Thousands of

trained food mechanics were caught in the various

draft s. You can find hash-sl ingers from the popular

price restaurants working side by side with real che fs

from the swagger restaurants and hotels. At the

army oven al l men are equal . They are only judged

by results.Any shortage in cooks i s readily filled for, l ike theBri tish , we have a School for Cooks . The men get acourse o f instruction in plain cookery . Then they are

given practical tests. They must try thei r food on

each other first . ! ou may be sure that thi s makesfor efliciency. The Government also i ssues a Manualfor Cooks which i s not only a complete and scientific

cookbook with hundreds of recipes and menus butalso shows with simple text and comprehensive pic

tures how to cut fore and hind quarters o f bee f andcarcasses of pork and mutton with the least possible

waste . There are i llustrations which Show cross-sec

tion o f field ranges and camp ovens . In order to meetany emergency or breakdown in kitchen equipment

there are specific di rections how to make an im


promptu fireless cooker by placing a milk-can in anordinary water container with hay or straw packed

between . This book i s as complete as any I have seen

in the war. It i s fool and waste proo f .The ave rage person i s apt to assume that because

the army kitchen is in the open , i n temporary quarters , or on the move i t i s lax and unsan i tary. As a

matter o f fact i t i s under rigid mil itary discipline . For

every one hundred men there i s a mess sergeant whois the czar of his l ittl e domain . The cooks

,dining

room orderlies and the Kitchen Police— the- are under him . The who do the scullery

work are recruited from the men di sciplined for minoroff ences . In scrubbing floors and gathering garbage

they have ample time to reflect on thei r misdeeds.“Cleanliness,

” to quote the army Order invokingi t,

“which i s stil l our most reliable protection againstd i sease ,

” i s drastica lly en forced . The army cooks

are required to keep thei r nai l s trimmed and clean .

They must scrub thei r hands with hot water and

so ft soap be fore entering the kitchen . There is a.

dai ly issue o f white caps and aprons which are worn

all up the line as far as the area of fighting.

Those gallant Briti sh cooks and kitchen orderlieswho dropped thei r frying pans and dishes and rushed

to the firing line at the first battle o f Ypres have nothing on thei r American comrades . Nearly every day

you hear o f some courageous Yankee who kept the

pot boil ing amid shot and shell . Not long ago an

army cook , Harry C . Ricket,was awarded the D i s

tinguished Service Cross. His performance was so

S . O . S .

remarkable that I present the Commander-in—Chie f ’ scitation . When you read it you realise that there isnot only honour but glory among cooks . Here it is

He maintained his kitchen at Chateau-de-la-Foret ,near Villers-sur-Fére

,France

,on July 2 8-2 9 , 19 18 ,

during a bombardment SO intense as to drive all otherkitchens out of the vi llage . When his stove had tobe taken to the rear

,he improvised a fire in the ground

and continued hi s work unti l ordered to leave . Hecarried water from a spring which was repeatedlyshelled when others would not approach it . Unaided ,of his own volition , he conducted a first aid stationfor wounded and exhausted men at his kitchen . Con

stantly in extreme personal danger from machine gunfire from low flying airplanes and bombardment byhigh explosive Shells , Cook Ricke t devoted himsel fentirely to the needs o f others and made possible thecare o f several hundred wounded, exhausted , andhungry men .

”

All the romance of the war i s not where danger

calls or the spotlight shines . Even so prosaic a task

as food procurement becomes a stirring i f smokelessdrama of achievement . It discloses a series of re

markable per formances by an equally remarkable man

who wi ll have a unique place in the record of the

A .E .P. To know what he did you must first know

who he is, for he is the embod iment of the real de

mocracy that constitutes our overseas force.

Back in 1897 an immigrant boy of sixteen , OttoH

.Goldstein by name , arrived in Chicago from his

home in Bohemia where hi s father was a rabbi . When

the war with Spain broke out he joined up as a pri


140 S . O . S .

and l ikewise meet any market emergency we musthave our own army coff ee industry . This i s how

Uncle Sam began hi s career as manu facturer for the

army on a large scale abroad .

Fortunately a large stock o f green coff ee was available . There had been a remarkably good coffee crop

In Brazi l just be fore the European war began . Ger

man financiers started to get a corner on it . As a

consequence dealers everywhere, in sel f-de fence,bought up immense quantities . With the outbreak of

war the attempted German coup failed,prices dropped,

and the market was flooded . Happily an immense

quantity o f this coffee was in France and it fell intothe hands o f the Chie f Quartermaster o f the A .E.F.

The problem was to find a man to run our coff ee

business . General Rogers had known of Major Gold

stein in hi s old regular army day. The Major had

dealt in coffee as a wholesaler in Chicago,so the

roasting and grinding job was put up to him . It

was easier said than done . No coff ee machinery was

avai lable in France so Goldstein designed roastersthat were vastly more sanitary

'

and efficient than the

French machines .He then set about to establish a factory at a little

town not far from Pari s and where he could have

both water and rai lway transport. It was impossible

to find a suitable structure so this indomitable one

time sergeant said : “I ’ l l build a factory .

” He leased

an abandoned brickyard , hired several hundred dis

abled French soldiers who made bricks stamped“U. S . and with them constructed a model elec

FEEDING THE DOUGHBOYS 14 1

trically-driven roasting and grinding coff ee plant.

When I saw i t one Sunday in Sep tember, 19 18 , i t wasusing pounds a day. The whole process i s

mechanical from the moment the green bean i s emptied from the original sack unti l i t emerges brown,fragrant and powdery into the fif ty-pound receptacle

in which it goes to storage or kitchen . Nearby wasa warehouse that contained tons o f the greencoffee.The process of roasting, grinding and hauling

which at current French rates would cost $1 1 2 a toni s done at the army factory for exactly Thi s

coffee i s delivered to the army kitchen at a cost to

the Government of 14 cents a pound . When the

present immense stock o f green coff ee i s exhaustedthe new supply will come direct from Brazil to France

which will save rehandling in the United States and

the second tonnage across the Atlantic . In order tom inimise haulage and be ready for any o f the contingencies that arise in war, Major Goldstein has instal led three other model roasting and grinding plants

,

all duplicates of the original establishment and wherewe will be able to prepare the enti re daily

rations by the first o f the year. At the Paris planthe has trained a corps of m en to operate them .

With the addition o f the ounce o f chocolate as adai ly rat ion component Major Goldstein launched hi s

second venture . Once more General Rogers wanted

to save tonnage and at the same time produce his ownarti cle and again the job was put up to the man whohad revolutionised the coffee business.

142 S . O . S .

In France the manu facture o f chocolate was greatlycurtai led during the war . This meant that acres o fchocolate-making machinery— most o f it controlled

by a small group o f manu facturers— were idle . It

took tact and diplom acy, however, to rent this machinery but Goldstein acquired it .

To-day in nearly a dozen factories we are producing over packages o f chocolate a month .

O f thi s pounds i s the ration made up in

ounce bars , while the rest is bonbons which are soldat the sales stores . With candy Major Goldstein has

wrought another tonnage saving revolution . Before

we went into the business these chocolate candies were

sold in pound circular tins that cost the men 54 cents

each . They not only used up vast quantities o f tinbut could not be carried on the person . Major Gold

stein packs the chocolates in flat cardboard hal f-pound

packages that fit into the pocket. At the same time

they save forty per cent in tin tonnage . What isequally important these packages are sold to the men

at 24 cents each . We also produce in our factoriesin France packages

, or pounds of

stick candy‘

and lemon drops a month . Formerly itwas packed in circular tins and cost 35 cents ; in the

flat cardboard boxes i t sells for 1 2 cents . MajorGoldstein is not particularly popular with the Amer

ican candy manu facturer but he i s ace high with the

soldiers over there .By these master strokes Major Goldstein came to

be regarded as a sort of Lloyd George o f army production .

“Let Goldstein do it,” became the maxim .


S . O . S .

after he got the order . By a mechanical process thatrivals the coff ee-roasting agency for simplicity andcleanliness he i s turning out a mill ion and a hal f

pounds o f macaroni a month . He is the Macaroni

Man .

Sum up the Goldstein a rmy achievement and youfind that he Operates exactly seventy factories largeand small that did not exist six months ago . With

hard bread,macaroni , coffee , and candy he i s saving

the tonnage o f eight large vessels a month . He hasa Brigadier ’ s sphere and authority. It i s typical of

the man that he should instal l a standardised factory

control and operation very much like the system o f

salesmanship and store arrangement in e ff ect i n a

well-known chain of retai l cigar stores in the United

States and which enables a man to go from a New

York branch to one in San Francisco and begin sell

ing goods without delay. In the same way MajorGoldstein i s training factory managers and foremen

so that they can change from one American establish

ment to another and take hold at once .Animating all these army factories is a spiri t o f

loyalty and a determination to win with coffee roaster

as with gun that finds expression in the astoundingresults that I have enumerated . They are inspired

by the example of thi s sel f-made soldier— a type of the

Ameri can by adoption who represents a patriotismbehind the l ines and elsewhere that i s kin to the dash

and gallantry of the fighting troops . There was scant

aid or com fort for the German in the revelation o f

what the Goldsteins of the American army did .

VI— The Cities of S upp ly

HE manu factured output, imposing as it ap

pears,i s a mere trifle in the vast sum o f sup

plies that we need for our army in France .

The great bulk of i t must be brought from America .

How do we keep the larder filled ! The answer brings

us to another and all-important l ink in the chain o f

army supply and to the door o f a vital branch o f the

American Business o f War.To see how it is done we must go back to General

Rogers’ establ ishment at Tours. In that eight-foot

blueprint chart of organisation that hangs on hi s wall

the Division of Supplies has the place o f honour inthe centre . Technically known as “Estimate

,Care

and Distribution ,” i t keeps its finger on the state o f

food supply overseas and i ts renewal . In charge i s

Colonel C . B . Crusan , whose job i s to se e that the

Quartermaster’s Shelves are always stocked .

The backbone of the whole system is the Automatic Supply by which con fusion

,hardship and short

age of food and supplies are avoided . It means, as

I explained in a previous chapter,the monthly upkeep

of the ninety days o f reserve stock— forty-five days

at the Base Depots,thi rty at the Intermediate and

fi fteen at the Advance— which i s kept in France for

all troops Shipped from the United States. Thi s

I45

S . O . S .

monthly replacement must o f course be mod ified tomeet expansion or emergency. The Automatic Supply also applies to forage

,clothing

,animal-drawn ve

hieles and all other supplies that come under the supervi sion of the Quartermaster Corps. Hence ColonelCrusan

’

s two principal labours are : first,to find out

just how many mouths— men and beast— we have to

feed and what we have on hand to feed them with ;second

, to allot the Quartermaster’ s tonnage so that

all needs and deficiencies will be supplied .

He i s able to keep a dai ly check on supplies by a

system of Intelligence which i s so complete and comprehensive that every morning there i s laid on hi s

desk and on the desk of the Chief Quartermaster,a

chart which shows the exact amount of ration com

ponents on hand in terms o f days at the twenty hugemain Supply Depots in France . This Dai ly Supply

State, as it i s technically called , i s one o f the manyremarkable exhibits o f centralised supply control that

provide the un failing antidote against hardship and

hunger. The in formation is sent in by telegraph be

tween 8 o’clock and midnight every night by StatisticalOfficers stationed at the Supply Depots . It arrivesduring the early hours

,is summarised , and set down

on individual cards . There is a card for each component . The master chart is made up from these cardsand is ready by the time General Rogers and his as

sistants are at thei r desks in the morning. At a glancethey know precisely what the food situation is .The Daily Chart of Ration Components and For

age on Hand— the Daily Supply State— i s so concrete


S . O . S .

number of rations i s then divided by the FeedingStrength in France

,and the result i s the day’ s sup

ply for all these troops .’

This Feeding Strength is

made up at regular intervals by the Adjutant Gen

eral . It i s the sum total of every mouth that we

must feed overseas . It does not matter whether it i s

the mouth o f a General or a teamster . All mouths

look alike when it comes to making up this great l isto f human maws which must be fi lled three times a

The Dai ly Chart enables the Chie f Quartermaster

to know i f he has a surplus or a shortage of a rationcomponent . I f he has a two hundred days’ supply of

dry beans and only sixty days’ supply of salt he evens

up these two items in hi s next tonnage allocation by

ordering more salt . Now we come to another important function . A S I have hitherto explained

,the ton

nage for France i s allocated every month . There i s

only a certain amount of tonnage which must be usedto the best possible advantage . The Chief Quarter

master i s allotted hi s share . It is up to him in turn

to allocate his allocation . Here is where the Daily

Chart comes in . From it he can see just what to req

uisition . I f he has the hypothetical two hundred days’

supply o f dry beans on hand i t means that he has a

big surplus over requirements . He can cut down his

requisition for beans and build up hi s requi sition for

salt. This i s a modification o f the Automatic Supply.

Thus,wherever you touch it tonnage allocation be

comes a matter of balancing and evening up .

Once that he knows what quantities to requisition

THE CITIES OF SUPPLY 149

he prepares hi s Priori ty Cable to the Acting Quar

termaster General at Washington . His items come

in the order of their urgency. First Urgency is al

ways Rations ; second is Forage ; third i s Clothing ;fourth

,Gasoline ; fi fth Equipage , which i s tentage ,

cooking and table utensi l s and field kitchens ; M iscel

laneous, which are tools, nai ls and kindred art icles ;and finally Animal-Drawn Vehicles .With the Quartermaster as with every other Serv

ice there are Exception Requi sitions which are sep

arate from the Automatic Supply or even the modifi

cations o f the Automatic Supply. These are the unex

pected demands that are constantly cropping up . They

may be for special tools , a particular kind of foodfor convalescents

,a special brand o f flour. These

are requi sitioned in special cables and usually marked“Expedite.”

Every item needed by the Quartermaster i s not

specified in hi s monthly cable . I f they were recorded

hi s cable would be as long as a serial story because

they number more than five thousand . At Washing

ton the standard requirements for every unit o f twenty

-five thousand men are on fi le and are shipped autom atically. The variations become the modificationsor the exceptional requirements . I t is interesting toadd that there i s a card in the Quartermaster ’ s Depart

ment at Tours for every one o f the five thousand

item s on his li st showing the exact quantity we have

on hand in France , when new supplies were ordered ,and when they are due.The Chie f Quartermaster really runs a Department

S . O . S .

Store, or rather a succession o f monster mai l and

telegraphic order houses. He is the great and glorified sutler . One o f his responsibi lities i s the mainte

nance at Tours of a sample room which includes a“sealed and approved” sample of the myriad items

that he handles . Side by S ide you can see tooth pasteand Service ribbons ; army ranges and field filtration

plants ; riding crop s and communion sets .The Chie f Quartermaster i s the biggest shipper in

the whole A .E.P. He monopolises rai lway tran s

port just as he uses up considerably more than hal fof all the available tonnage. This means that the

Chie f of the Supplies Divi sion must establish a very

intimate liai son with the Transportation Department.

Every day Colonel Crusan gets a detai led report by

telegraph from every Supply Depot giving the num

ber, freight , and destination of every subsistence carloaded and shipped . Here i s where we establish an

other contact with our old friend the Railway Trans

port Officer.An adequate stati stical system is as nece ssary to thesuccess ful conduct o f the Quartermaster Corps as lu

bricating oil i s to a machine. The whole structureo f ceaseless Operation depends upon systemati sed

knowledge o f what is going on . New Supply Depots

are be ing constantly set up and the army grows daily.

! ou are there fore not surprised to find at Tours aSchool for Statistical Officers which i s in charge of

the Chie f Statistician of the Quartermaster Corps,who happens to be Captain R . H . Hess. In civi l l i fe

he was a professor at the University o f Wisconsin.


S . O . S .

army overseas would have been equal to the combinedBritish and French forces in France . To maintain thisarmy at full strength from July Ist

,19 18 , to June

3oth , 19 19, would have required the annexation o f

a world of supplies without end or precedent .We will begin with subsistence. It would have

taken approximately pounds o f fresh

beef ; pounds of tinned bee f ;pounds o f potatoes ; pounds of coff ee,which wil l make gallons ;pounds o f jam ; pounds o f sugar ; 888,

pounds of flour ; pounds of ba

con ; and pounds of evaporated milk.

With clothing the figures are no less bewildering .

The army needs would have been pairs o f

breeches ; wool coats ; caps ; 18,Shoes ; pairs of stockings ;

000 pairs of rubber boots ; spiral puttees

or exactly miles of the yellow leg wrappers .

I might add for further edification that the amount

o f cloth for breeches and wool coats wi ll aggregate

yards.I f you want stil l another glimpse o f super quantityI have only to add that in the matter o f hay alone our

beasts would have eaten pounds . Inbales double compressed and placed end to end thishay would reach one and a hal f times round the earthat the equator. Stacked ten feet high these bales

would cover 460 acres . It i s enough hay to last one

horse years .So far we have dealt with supplies on paper. W e

THE CITIES OF SUPPLY

can now go into the mechanics of operation and follow the actual food from port to trench . We willbegin at the docks where the trains

,loaded direct

from the ships,are rushed to the Base Supply Depots ,

the first stage of our j ourney and which are usually

located from five to ten miles from the ports . Underideal conditions these establishments must maintain

forty-five days’ rations for the whole overseas forces .

They are all similar in scope and system . For the

sake of il lustration I will take one of the largest which

incarnates American hustle at its height . It i s at

St . Sulpice near Bordeaux.

A year ago the site was a serene stretch of farm

and vineyard ; to day it i s a City o f Warehouses that

throbs with incessant movement . Here as elsewherethe warehouses are arranged in the form o f a huge

ladder. Three warehouses, end on end , are the rungswhile the main lines o f rai lways are on the sides .

Connecting these main l ines are endless spurs which

enable the cars to be switched right up to the doorfor unloading and reloading. There are usually three

Grand Groups o f structures each divided into Sections

which contain six warehouses . Some o f these Groupscomprise fi fty or sixty buildings . We use a standard

warehouse fi fty feet wide and four hundred feet long.

Some are of fabricated steel and can be erected inten hours ; others have wooden supports with corru

gated iron sides and roofs . We must build and use

at the same time . Often a warehouse i s fil led withfood be fore it i s under roo f . These immense Depotsl iterally grow overnight .

154 S . O . S .

The specific Depot that we are visiting would have

had, when completed , nearly feet o f closed

storage and feet of open storage . Two~

thirds had been installed when I saw i t late last August. Ninety per cent o f the space i s used for Quar

termaster Stores . You can wander through acres

and acres of food . A S ingle unfloored warehouse contains pounds of flour. In a comparatively

small group of buildings I saw rations o f

milk ; rations of tobacco ; ra

tions of canned pork and beans ; rations of

sugar ; rations o f flour ; and

rations o f coff ee . This mass o f merchandise, whichmerely represented the foot-hills of our overseas range

o f subsistence, was all brought from the United

States , a fi tting tribute to the triumph of our sea

transport over the German submarine .The vastness o f these Depots i s such t hat an in

spection on foot or even in an automobile i s out of

the question . They are so criss-crossed with rails

that you must use a“Scooter,

” which is a motordriven hand-car fitted for standard—gauge tracks . Ittook me nearly hal f an hour to travel over this plantat passenger train speed . Every important official has

his own “Scooter” and you can see them scooting over

the place at all hours of the day and night .Although millions of rations pour in and pass out

every day there i s such a perfect system o f control

that every case and sack is accounted for. Even the

broken packages are carefully assembled and repacked.

They are eternally under a sleepless scrutiny that lets


S . O . S .

in the plant and which i s the sum of these Warehouse Cards . From it the Statistica l Officer takes the

totals which he telegraphs to the Chief Quartermasterat Tours every night and which go to make up theDai ly Chart o f Ration Components that General Rog

ers finds on hi s desk every morning.

At a Base Supply Depot as many as four hundredcars come and go every twenty-four hours. How

are they handled ! In a tiny office in the midst of

those seething acres— “our l ittle hut on the hump ,

”

as i t i s called , for the gravity hump o f the rai lway

classification yard is nearby— sits the Co-ordinating

Ofl‘icer who runs the whole traffic show . His j ob i s

to co-ordinate orders, cars and shipments and, to

quote one of them ,

“ i t i s som e co-ordinating.

”

It would take a book to give a complete record of

what these do . Briefly the system is this :

when a train arrives from a port an Assistant C0

ordinating Officer chalks on each car the number of

the warehouse to which i t must go . This i s called“spotting” a car. I f i t i s flour it goes to a flour ware

house ; canned goods to a grocery warehouse , and

so on. He has in hand a l ist o f available structures.

Every eff ort is bent to “ spot” cars at night and atnoon whi le the labourers are eating or sleeping so as

to avoid pulling cars in or out whi le others are beingloaded or unloaded . A fter the train i s marked it i s

broken up and switched to the warehouses for un

loading. This completes the work on incoming trains.

For outgoing trains the shipping order first goes

to the Co-ordinating Off icer who computes the number


of cars requi red . These cars are then spotted for

the warehouses from which the supplies are to besecured . An “Order to load” autom atically goes to

the Storekeepers who not only load but attach to

each car the United States Army label which gives,in English and French , the car number, mark, destina

tion,date of shipment, weight, contents , consignor,

consignee and the signature of the person who loads

and seals the car. I t i s now up to the Rai lway Transport Officer to assemble these cars and send them on

thei r way. A so-called convoy,that i s an enlisted

man , i s sent with each train-load of supplies as guard .

He i s required to report its arrival at destination by

wire.The rai lway yards that are part of thi s establish

ment include a cold storage plant which wi ll have acapacity o f tons o f bee f a day ; a waterworkssystem ; coal yard ; ash dump , and completely equipped

locomotive shops . Practically every scrap of mate

rial employed came across three thousand miles of

submarine-infested seas. I ci te these facts merely

to Show the immense amount of construction that

attaches to the installation o f these Depots alone .Prodigies of labour are performed every day at this

and other Depots and they are merely part of the rou

tine. Upon one occasion an order came in for a

hurry-up shipment of flour for the French army. Itwas at the close of a boiling day in August and the

negro labourers— those smiling darkeys from the cot

ton plantations of the South— were “all in . The

flour had to be loaded and shipped at once. The

1 58 S . O . S .

Director o f LabOur assembled hi s men ( i t was justa fter supper ) , told them of the emergency, and cal ledfor volunteers . Every man responded . In exactlyfif ty

-five minutes those black heroes had loaded 700,

000 pounds of flour in sacks , and ten minutes later

the special train was on its way. Such i s the spiri t of

the

At another Base Supply Depot— Montoi r, near St .

Nazai re— bigger in area and action than the one Ihave just described

,the proj ect called for two hun

dred standard warehouses or square feeto f covered storage and square feet of

closed . More than hal f were up and fi lled when I

was there while new buildings were going up at therate of one a day. Two hundred mi les o f rai lway

already linked up this C i ty o f Supply, the Mayor o fwhich was Colonel Alexander E . Williams, Depot

Quartermaster,a famous football star in his day at

West Point and who bucks the line of suppl ies with

the same force and success as he did on the grid-i ron .

While making a tour o f inspection with him I sawGerman prisoners , American-captured , for the first

time in this war. I asked one o f them what he thought

of America ’ s war participation as shown by the vast

community o f supplies of which he was an unwilling

member and he replied ( as most o f them replied wher

ever I found them within our lines ) :“We had no

idea that America was doing SO much . Our officerstold us that there were only a few o f your soldiers

in France .” Here is a significant revelation of Ger

man method s . The great American off ensive launched


S . O . S .

Once more you have the bustl ing spectacle of im

mense rehandling,storing

,reloading and shipment of

bulk stores— al l under that sam e admirable control

that records everything and loses nothing. The Depo t

Quartermaster,Colonel O . G . Collins , i s the centre of

what seems to be an interminable eff ort . Yet i t i s athis fingers’ ends all the time . The plan of Depot

Standardisation put into eff ect by General Rogers last

Septembe r has stabili se d the whole storage process .

There 18 only space le ft for me to enlarge upon twoof the many features which make thi s Depot unique

in the whole story o f army supply. The first i s the

system o f ice making and cold storage that we have

set up in the midst o f those one-t ime fields. When Itell you that this factory has a daily ice making capac

i ty of 500 tons ( it i s the largest ice plant under. one

roo f in the world ) and that its five cold storage rooms

hold tons o f bee f,you get some idea of what

one branch of the Quartermaster Corps here repre

sen ts . Figuring on a basi s of a pound o f meat per

person one storage room alone would supply the c ityof Chicago for a whole day, while the total capacityo f the five storage rooms would provide meat for thecombined populations o f New York , Chicago , Philadelphia

,St . Louis , Detroit, Boston and Cleveland for

the same period . The cooling coils for the expansionof ammonia lai d end to end would reach from New

York to Philadelphia . This establishment built bythe army for the army

,and constructed in less than

five months, employs six hundred men day and night .

Every twenty-four hours one hundred and twenty cars

THE CITIES OF SUPPLY 16 1

are handled at its platforms. From tiled floor to

smoke-stack al l the material u sed was transported

from America.

The second outstanding feature i s the remarkable

system o f Car Control . At thi s Depot more freight

cars are handled than at any other. Seventeen en

gines are required for switching work alone . In

August thi rteen thousand cars came and went and

the number increases each month . In the early days

it was comparatively easy for the Depot Quarter

master to keep track o f traffic . He could walk over

the yards and see everything with his own eyes. When

those tens o f cars expanded into hundreds and the

project annexed square mi les thi s was a physical im

possibi lity. I t i s v ital ly necessary for him to know

the Car and Labour situation every hour. He faced

a serious problem .

Colonel Collins met thi s emergency by dev i singwhat i s known as the Location and Distributi on Board .

At first glance you think that it i s one of those huge

boards covered with coloured pegs that the militarystrategists use to block out war gam es. As a mattero f fact i t is a large board which i s an exact plan inwood o f the Quartermaster’ s Depot showing ware

houses, open storage space , ice plant and the rai lroadspurs . The Subsistence warehouses are in red , Cloth

ing in blue , Miscellaneous in green , Forage in yellow,

and Animal Drawn Transportation in brown . In

front of every miniature warehouse i s a successi on

of hole s for the insertion of pegs. These pegs represent cars and are stuck in or rem oved as the cars are

S . O . S .

loaded, unloaded or sent away. A black peg repre

sents a car to be unloaded , a white peg i s an empty

car ; a red peg a car to be switched ; a combinationgreen and black peg i s a car in process of loading ; a

green peg i s a car ready for shipment . The Labour

units whose capacity i s three cars eve ry four hours ,are indicated by steel nai ls that fit the holes . Hereare the pawns and the board for the al l-important

game of car location and labour dist ribution . How

i s i t played !Across from the Board sits the Traffic Officer who

gets constant telephone report s of the Spotting” and

location o f cars and the progress o f work . He com

municate s these facts to three men whose sole task is

to keep pegs and nai ls properly placed . The Board

i s reset every hour. Colonel Collins’ s office adjoins

the bui lding in which it i s located and he can step

in every few minutes and see at a glance just whatthe situation is . I f traffic i s booming he stands by

the Board all day. I f the Board shows a string o f

black pegs with only one nai l alongside i t means that

there i s insufficient labour there. He at once looksfor a predominance of labour elsewhere and orders a

readjustment . Hence the Board enables work toprogress with uni formity. Likewise i t indicates the

improper location of cars and thus prevents congestion . The whole obj ective in any Supply Depot i s to

keep cars moving. Every minute that a car standsidle its tonnage i s lost to the army. Once congestionbegins i t i s likely to become cumulative . The Board

p rov ides insurance against thi s contingency.


164 S . O . S .

The Divi sional Pack Train there fore hauls every ra

tion component from pepper to fresh bee f for

men . These trains go up every day.

The Advance Depot warehouse must necessari ly

be a glorified grocery shop . I t carri es an average o f

Balanced Rations which flow f rom the load

ing plat forms on gravity rol lers into the waiting cars

and are checked up by French gi rl s who relieve able

bodied men for other tasks . Every unit , whether Ma

chine Gun Battalion or Division , has its goods marked

in its name. The car, however, i s consigned to the

Railhead where the Rai lhead Oflicer, who has a lisf

of al l the organisations he se rves , does the distributing. Despite the ceaseless ebb and flow o f supplies

the Depot Quartermaster at an Advance Depot keeps

a daily check on stock on hand ; cars received, un

loaded and sent on ; food , fuel , forage and clothes

shipped , and the state of labour.But units are constantly moving ; disease , accidents

or casualties thin ranks ; replacements of men are con

tinually coming up . How can the Depot Quartermaster adapt his dai ly shipments to these constan t

changes ! Once more you touch an interlocking System o f Daily Intelligence that chronicles change and

swi ftly adapts supplies to needs. It brings us for

the first time to the threshold of one o f the most useful and important individuals in the whole-the Regulating Officer: In the Bri tish Army he

merely regulates the Divisional Trains at the Triage,as the Regulating Station i s called in French . With

us he not only does this but i s the Traffic and Supply


Boss in hi s part of the Advance Section and holds

down a job of many-sided responsibi lities.Let u s tarry for a while wi th the Senior Regulating

Oflicer of the Colonel M . R . Hilgard , a mas

ter manipulator o f transpo rtation and a sure enoughlive wire . “Be Brie f and Be Quick” i s his motto ;there are no chai rs in hi s office which occupies part

o f a li ttle frame building near a rai lway station some

where in Northern France . A year ago this parti cular

spot drowsed along with routine traflic ; to— day it i sa maze o f rai ls that bustl e with animation . Three

thousand cars have found trackage there at one time.This Regulating Station i s the neck o f the whole

American Supply Bottle . Choke i t up and the floodo f food stops and the fighting man goe s hungry.

The army accepts no excuses . Supplies must move.This i s why you find a man of the Hilgard calibre in

charge . He is at his desk from early morning unti l

midnight and sometimes longer. When he goes to

bed ( he lives within a stone’

s throw) there i s a telephone alongside . The traffic Manager o f the Union

Pacific system has never faced problems more v italor complicated than the anxieties that press down on

him every hour o f the twenty-four. He only knowsone law , which is Troops must be fed .

” Once when

there was a congestion o f traflic for a few hours he

commandeered two hundred motor trucks from everywhere and everybody and kept the supp l ies moving.

To Colonel Hilgard— as to any other Regulating

Off icer— come the Daily Requisitions for food at the

front . Every D ivi sion has a code name. Let us

166 S . O. S .

say that i t i s Isabel . I f Isabe l i s at ful l feedingstrength the Daily Requisition for her would simply

read : “Isabel The Depot Quartermaster has

the l i st of Divi sional requirements on fi le and fi ll s

them automatically. I f Isabel has been in action and

has had casualties the Daily Wire would read :

Isabel which means that thi s unit has

lost men . I f Isabel has gone back to a restcamp at ful l strength the message would say :

“Isabel

has moved to Blank— No change .” I have used the

simplest and most elemental i llustrations. Sometimes

the units are indicated by numbers .At this point you will ask :

“Who makes up these

Feeding Strengths ! ” This i s an easy matter.

Every Division has a D ivisional Quartermaster to

whom each unit in that Division ( and they are som etimes scattered ) report s its daily strength . These

Divi sional Quartermasters report to the Corps to

which they are attached and the Corps in turn through

its G1 or Procurement Section,reports to the G4 o f

the Army in the field o f which it i s a part . The G4,

which i s the Great Provider,renders the Consolidated

Feeding Strength to the Regulating Officer. Hence

Colonel Hilgard knows every day how many mouths

must be fed . He orders the Depot Quartermaster of

the Advance Depot nearest to him ( in thi s case they

happen to be located S ide by side) to ship . The loaded

cars are turned over to the Regulating Officer who

hands the Railway Transport Officer the l ist of unitsfor whom they are intended . The trains are made

up and sent off like clockwork to the Railheads.The


S . O . S .

When you reach the Rai lhead you are in the Zone

of the Armies. You have gone as far as the standard

gauge railroad dares to go . You are up where men

wear steel helmets and are required to keep thei r gas

masks accessible . There i s the usual insurance

against em ergency for every Railhead carries th ree

days’ supplies in reserve and also a stock of under and

outer clothing for five thousand men to renew the

wear and tear of actual fighting and gas casualties .

The moment a man is gassed his clothing i s removed

and destroyed . The underclothing i s for use at the

Bathing and Deverm inising establishments . Just as

soon as men come out o f the trenches they are re

quired to bathe . Thei r clothes are fumigated- the

cooties” are no respecters o f persons— and their

underwear sent back to a Salvage Depot .From Railhead the supplies are Shipped by motor

trucks or light rai lways to the Refill ing Point which

i s the last food frontier. The boom of guns is nowheard and the nights are o ften made hideous by ai rraiders . More than one Refilling Point has lost its

entire stock in trade by Shel l explosion . Work never

ceases for most o f the road traffic up here must beunder the friendly cover o f night . Although exposed

to all these hazards the Refi lling Point maintains an

adequate system o f office records and a scrutiny whichincludes an inspection o f the fresh beef that comes

in every day.

There are no frills in thi s much-menaced ArmyRetai l Store . Its customers are hungry soldiers

whose minds are mainly on two things : food and


fighting. They brook no delay. Every morning

Non-commissioned officers arrive with Ration Re

turns made out by the Subsistence officers of thei r

units and which are the orders for the next day ’ s supplies. These supplies are loaded on l ight rai lways i f

the country i s not too much’

exposed to shell-fire , or

on three-ton motor t rucks . Where food i s furnished

to men actually engaged in combat it i s conveyed to

them in that ancient army standby, the mule-drawn

wagon . These vehicles delive r their freight to the

Supply or Mess Sergeants at the “dumps” i n the

field , who hand them over to the cooks .Even wi thin S ight o f No Man ’ s Land there i s the

inevi table precaution against hunger and hardship

which marks the whole American Supply Service . It

i s embodied in the Rese rve Ration o f canned meat ,hard bread

,essence of coff ee

,sugar and chocolate ,

packed in gas-proo f tin containers and which are kept

constantly in the trenches . They are only consumed

in a grave emergency such as a break-down in foodsupply in the rear and by order o f the Commanding

Officer. These containers hold twenty-five rationseach and are so hermetically sealed that I have seen

them floating around in water. They are the prope rty of the trenches and must not be removed .

At the Refill ing Point you encounter a striking i llus

tration o f American Supply resource . Wherever a

considerable body o f our t r oops i s stationed you finda Sales and Commissary Store where the men can

buy li ttle luxuries such as candy,too th brushes and

paste , Shaving sticks, cigars and razor blades at cost .

S . O . S .

When men are in the trenches or in the lines immediately behind, they can not go to these Stores. In

order to supply their wants the S tore goes to them

in the Shape o f a Travelling Commissary which i s

nothing more or less than an old-time pedlar ’ s outfit

inhabiting a five-ton motor truck . At dawn this shop

on wheels stocks up its shelves and chugs down the

road often under shell-fire and does business not only

within sound o f the guns but frequently with in gun

shot. It represents the final word in army con

venience .

! ou have now followed the doughboys’ food from

ship to stomach . The only American soldier in France

who went un fed was a dead one .


172 S . O . S .

Transport history in the war activiti es of the two

Engli sh-speaking nations .When Bri tain leaped to arms almost overnight shehad no regular army motor units o f consequence .The War Office depended for the provision o f motor

transport in the event o f the mobilisation o f an Expeditionary Force on a certain number o f subsidised

trucks already in use in civi l work and on civi lian

chauffeurs and drivers . Hence,when the Empire

rushed to the relie f o f Belgium it only had thi s more

or less makeshi ft equipment . It started in to buy

trucks both in the United States and at home and the

result was an infinite vari ety o f typ es and make .

Here began the outstanding evi l i n army motor main

tenance,which was— and remains— the need o f tens

of thousands o f di ff erent kinds o f spare parts and

accessories for the upkeep o f thi s Congress of Vehi

cles . Standardisation,which means interchangeable

parts,was out o f the question .

Practically the same thing happened when America

came in .

” Despite three years of warning and with

the exception o f the experience that we gained in

Mexico and during mobilisation on the border, our

army was unprepared with any sort of sufficient Motor

Transport . We had to comb out the avai lable sup

ply o f trucks and cars and the result was that the

Mechanical Transport equipment in France for twelve

months a fter we entered the confl ict represented

almost every known available product . When I tell

you that we are required to keep diff erent non

interchangeable spare parts in stock you get some

DETROIT IN FRANCE 173

idea of the price we pay for unreadiness in motorequipment . More than this , we must constantly main

tain kinds o f bolts , nuts and screws , which

means that the shelves o f our Spare pa rt store-rooms

carry a total o f separate items . With the ex

ception of the parts for the comparatively few Bri ti sh ,French and Italian cars that we use , al l thi s must

be brought from the United States .

It simply means that with Mechanical Transport,as with practically every other Se rvice of Supply, we

had to begin at the very beginning and bui ld from

the ground up . In the face o f these handicaps , and

every difficulty that lack o f standardisation impose s,our fighting subs istence forces , so fa r as the motor is

concerned,have been able to carry on from the start .

The same spi rit o f i ndomitable endeavour that planted

bridges , reared docks and made cit ies o f Supply grow

out o f the swamps,has found incarnation in the

American Motor World that has arisen overseas .

It not only operates and maintains over gaso

lene-driven vehicles but somewhere in that war-tom

land you can find a dynamic cross-section o f Detroit

which bui lds automobiles from raw material up to

the finished vehicle on wheel s ready for peaceful perform ance or combat work . The story o f the Motor

Transport Corps — the as it i s more com

mouly known— is one o f the impressive narratives ofAmerican war participation .

Let us go back a bit . When General Pershing

dashed into Mexico “to capture Villa dead or alive”

the biggest problem o f the moment was to supply him

S . O . S .

because his food had to be carried across many miles

of arid country. At that time the Chie f Quarter

master of the Southern Department, charged with the

task of feeding the Pershing Expedition , was our oldfriend Major General Harry L . Rogers , the present

Chief Quartermaster of the American ExpeditionaryForce and Quartermaster General to the whole Army.

He said to himsel f : “The only way to maintain food

communications in Mexico i s with motor-trucks .

But where were the trucks to come from !

Like England we had talked and written a great

deal about the value o f the motor-truck to the army

yet at that time there were less than a thousand in

the whole American military establishment and like

the army they were scattered throughout the Uni tedStates and the Philippines . When a certain American

Maj or General wanted a car for use on a long inspec

tion trip in Cali fornia all he could get was authorityto buy a “

flivver”! This happened on March 16th

less than three weeks be fore we entered the war.The trouble was that the old dyed-in-the-wool regu

lar officer confused Horse Transport with Mechanical

Transport,which are totally diff erent propositions .

With the horse and wagon only a fixed amount o f

work can be done each day. W i th a mechanically

driven vehicle there is no such restriction . Normallymotor equipment may be operated the greater part

of the twenty-four hours . It becomes merely a matter

o f care and upkeep .

In the vernacular of trade General Rogers — he was

then only a Colonel— “sold” the idea of Mechanical


176 S . O . S .

needed , but thanks to Vi lla we had the germ of a

service which now began to expand .

Among the veterans o f the Mexican campaign was

the then Major F. H . Pope— ( he is now Colonel )a young West Pointer , stocky of bui ld and determined

of purpose,who had studied motor transport in the

French Army Supply School in 19 15. He was in

charge o f one o f the largest truck trains that chugged

into Mexico with food and supplies for the Pershing

Expedition . Realising the need of a trained person

nel for the army, he started a School for Chauff eurs

at San Antonio where he was able to turn out a

truck driver in ten days in what was facetiously called

a “Get-trained-quick” course . Just as Pope was one

o f the pioneers in Texas so was he now a path-finder

in France . Around him was reared the structure of

our Motor Transport Serv ice abroad . This,however,

i s a later story.

The moment we went to war the Reserve Officersbegan to pour in . Every man who had ever sold an

automobi le , owned one,or wanted to own one , had

an ambition to get into the Motor Transport Serv ice.

Scores of these men at once became Chauff eurs-In

structors and were shunted off to the cantonments

where they started schools . The so-called Truck

Master, usually a sergeant who had served in Mexico,bui lt up the Motor organi sations in these camps.

Those seasoned three and five-ton trucks that hadtravelled axle-deep through the Mexican sands were

commandeered for work at home instead of being

used as the beginnings of the motor fleets in France.

COLONEL POPECOLONEL 11. A. HEGEM AN

LIEUT. COL . M . R . WAINER COLONEL H . C. SM ITHER


178 S . O . S .

mained without a definite head unti l September, 19 17 ,when the Commander-in-Chie f sent a memorandum to

General Rogers , just installed as Chief Quartermaster,directing that al l Motor Transport be placed under hi s

di rection . The Father o f Mechanical Transport tothe American Army thus became sponsor for its de

veIOpm ent in the World War and on a scale un

dreamed of when he first urged motori sation down

at Texas .Meanwhile Colonel F . H . Pop e had arrived in

France . General Rogers looked about for a tem

porary Head of the in fant service . His choice fell on

the stocky young officer who had sweated on thos e

early t ruck trains under the scorching Mexican sun.

Pope took hold at once,the scattered vehicles and

drivers were assembled under a centralised authori ty ;Motor Reception Parks were established at the Base

ports , and“M .T . came into being as a full-fledged

i f struggling organisation .

The handicaps which attended the launching of

every Serv ice o f Supply abroad took up their abode

with Motor Transport . There was the usual Short

age o f equipment and trained personnel . Colonel

Pope and his colleagues began to buy anything they

could get in Europe and especially in England , which

accounts for the fact that you o ften se e five-tonlorries sti ll bearing the W .D . and the familiar white

arrow that proclaim the British War Office origin ,manned by doughboys and carrying American supplies .

This buying in Britain did three things . It provided

immediate equipment, saved tonnage, and minimised


the spare part problem . Profiting by thi s experi ence

we are now using Italian cars in Italy. It pays to

use the car of the country because equipment can be

renewed without delay.

As soon as our motor engine was cranked up in

France the difference between operation there and in

Mexico— the only other place where American equip

ment had seen active se rvice— be came apparent . In

Villa’ s country there was a small volume o f business

and a long haul with no fuel or repai r stations . In

France it was just the reverse . The bulk of carry

ing was tremendous , the distances were short , and by

agreement with the Briti sh and French Motor Services

our trucks and cars could obtain fuel and repairs prae

tical ly every ten or twenty miles i f necessary. This

co operative eff ort has been invaluable , especially in

the pioneer days when our Service was in the building.

For a considerable pe riod Motor Transport re

mained under the control o f the Chie f Quartermaster.

It grew so fast , however , that it was made a separateServ ice with a Director in Charge and became part o f

the Service o f Uti liti es,which was subsequently ex

panded into the present Services of Supply. Thi s

means that the Capital of our Motor Empire abroad

i s in that histori c little city of Tours,the nerve centre

of Supply and Transport for the whole A .E .F. In

a reorganisation growing out of a swi ft expansionBrigadier General M . L . Walker

,a far-visioned engi

neer of ripe army experience,became Director of what

i s now officially known as the Motor Transport Corps .Colonel Pope was installed as Deputy Director. From

S . O . S .

their offices radiates the control o f the American

Motor Machine across the sea.

I f you have read the preceding chapters in this book

you know that the management of American Busi

ness o f War is preci sely like that o f any big Corporation that i s scientifically and there fore efficiently con

ducted . Hence the Motor Transport Corps i s thor

oughly charted and diagrammed . The scope andfunction o f every branch from the immense Reception Parks at the ports which contain thousands of

vehicles, down to a lonely garage on the highway incharge o f one man , are on paper. Behind the Director

hangs a huge map o f the roads o f France showing

the truck routes from sea to front in red ; with Recep'

tion and Service Parks in blue ; with A .E.P. gasolene

stations indicated by white flags and French by

yellow .

The whole M .T .C. naturally falls into two sep

arate sections : one which operates in the domain of theServices o f Supply behind the lines ; the other which

is part o f the Combat Armies in the field . By fol

lowing the equipment from the time it arrives in

France until i t del ivers men,food and ammunition at

the firing line you can run the whole range and see

precisely how the scheme operates .Looking at the general plan o f organisation in the

S OS . first you find that the Director of the MotorTransport Corps sits as President o f the concern ,

while the Deputy Director is Vice President and General Manager. The six principal Divisions are : Ad

mini stration,which deals with oflice management, per


S . O . S .

Trucks that must carry men and supplies across the

ferti le fields o f France.

Washington , which i s the Procurement Centre, must

know just what equipment to ship abroad . France

there fore periodically prepares the Master Chart of

Motor Requirements. Its duplicate hangs at Tours .

When you see these immense Sheets— they are six

feet high— you begin to real ise just what it means

to keep our Motor Empire going. The Truck Sheet

alone call s for 1 19 di fferent kinds o f trucks, tenders ,trailers

,carts and ambulances . This immense variety

naturally results from the fact that every Serv ice in

France draws its equipment from the

There must be special trucks and trailers for the Ai r

Service ; huge steel-wheeled carriers for Forestry

Service ; portable auto rock crushers ; t rucks for tar

distributing ; trai lers for heating oil and water ; trucks

for balloon winches ; trai lers with portable cranes ;gasolene tank trucks, kitchen trai l-mobiles ; machine

gun cars ; dental trucks which are travelling dental

laboratories with every fixture of a well-equipped den

tist office in New York or Philadelphia ; ammunition

trucks ; radio trucks on which the field wireless out

fits are mounted ; fire apparatus trucks , because every

Base and Supply Depot has its completely equipped

motorised Fire Department ; mobile machine shops ;

and photographic trai lers on which the Ai r S ervice

bui lds i ts i tinerant studios. I could continue the list

for a good while . Practically every Service in

France has some special kind of motor equipment


which must be described down to the last screw in a

specification which goes to Washington .

All motor equipment for France must be ordered

not less than three and usually four months ahead ;first be cause i t takes time for manufacture, and sec

ond because o f the delays and hazards o f sea trans

port . This means that the Demands up to January

Ist,19 19, are al ready long on fi le in the office of the

Acting Quarte rmaster General in Washington and the

orders are being fi l led in scores of motor plants from

Detroit south .

These Motor Transport arm y requirements from

motor cycles up to Specially constructed five-ton trucksare based on army need s as shown by organisations

in France , by advance notice o f troop sailings,and

wear and tear on equipment in use and the necessityo f keeping reserv e stocks. With motor equipment

as with food and all other supplies,there must be a

large available surplus to meet losses due to enemy

action , accidents or the terrific and incessant usage.A chart , which i s a marvel o f detai l , sets forth the

preci se situation in France . The equipment in use or

in Reception and Reserve Parks i s in black,while the

needs o f the A .E .F. are indicated in red . This i sthe so-called Status o f Motor Vehicles in France.Motor Transport gets an al lotment o f tonnage from

the United States every month just like the Quarter

master Corps or the Air Service . I f thi s allotment

i s for tons the Procurement D ivi sion must

make up its own Priori ty Schedule which indicates

whether trucks or passenger cars have the bulk of the

S . O . S .

space . These requirements are reduced to weight andcubic tons and then transmitted to the G1 Section of

the General Staff which forwards them to Washing

ton . In the Acting Quartermaster General ’ s office in

Washingt on i s a Motor Transport Bureau which

places contracts with the manu facturers.As soon as a truck or car reaches a port in France

it i s caught up in a control which keeps a continuous

check on i t during the whole period of service and

unti l i t goe s into the scrap-heap . Even then the ma

terial i s salvaged and becomes part o f the recorded

structure o f a new vehicle or a retrieved part . At

each port that we use you find a SO-called Motor Re

ception Park , which means precisely what the name

implies . Here you find every kind o f mechanical

transport . Each Park has a complete organisation in

charge o f the Commanding Officer who has the usual

Administrative and Service Divisions under him .

Administration deals with office management,person

nel , records , barracks for the hundreds o f casuals who

come in constantly from America . In the Serv ice

Branch you find inspection,park problems, supplies,

convoying,maintenance and repai r. In other words,

each o f these Parks— and the same thing obtains inall the other kinds o f Parks which you wil l find as

you go up the l ine— i s a completely equipped sel f-con

tained Serv ice,able to set up , repai r and maintain any

kind of motor transport . Here i s where the value of

a standardised system comes in .

Motor Transport arrives in France in two ways

One portion i s shipped on i t s own wheels, which


S . O . S .

day ; when the order comes to move i t can be startedoff without a moment ’ s delay.

Most of these Reception Parks , l ike our Supply

Cities, have risen overnight. One week a stretch of

flats or swamp off ends the eye ; the next it i s covered

wi th acres of trucks and cars whose freshly paintedbodies gleam in the sunlight . Office bui ldings

,bar

racks and kitchens have also sprung up like magic .I t i s all part of the many-sided miracle of America

in France. These Parks are usually in charge o f Reserve Officers who have le ft motor factories or sales

rooms to do thei r bit in the army. Typical of these

men i s the Commanding Officer at the largest Base

Park— at St . Nazaire — who is Lieut .-Col . Will H .

Brown , one o f the founders o f a mighty automobile

insti tution in the Middle West ; who served a term

as State Senator in Indiana and who dropped everything to go to France at the outbreak o f war.

Throughout the whole you find thi s cal ibre

o f man who has met the emergency with the same

courage and resource with which a rmed attack i s faced

at the front .Here is a case in point : Last winter when the Sec

ond Reception Park was in process of organisation a

hurry-up requisition came from our li ttle a rmy up in

storm-ridden Northern France . It read : “Send two

t ruck trains at once .” In charge of this Park was

Major C . M . Elwell , a rangy, sinewy Middle West

erner who had been a prize automobile salesman . Hehad the chasses but no bodies . He called hi s small

force together and said : “The army must have those


trucks . We have no bodies . There fore we mustbuild them .

” Day and night hi s men,who included

collegians fresh from thei r studies,l iteral ly worked

like beavers. Fortunately there were three carpenters

among them . They improvi sed hay-wagon bodies

and in less than a week forty truck s were on the wayto the front.As soon as a vehicle arrives at the Recep tion Park

it receives its first dose o f routine. Like a convict

and no galley slave eve r worked harder than our

Motor Transport in France— it gets a number and

hence forth it i s known only by that numeral , which i s

the so-called “U.S . Number. This rule applies to

the Commander-in-Chie f ’ s l imousine with the Same

force as to a “flivver.

” The numbering system is characteristic o f the Serv ice . The first numeral always

indicates the Type o f Car. All our motor vehicles

are classified according to type . Passenger cars , re

gardless o f size or body,are Type 1 ; l ight delivery

trucks of one-ton or less are Type 2 ; three and fourton trucks are Type 4 ; five-ton trucks and over areType 5 ; motor cycles with or without S ide-cars areType 6 ; caterpi llars which haul the heavy guns areType 9 ; even the kitchen trailers have a designationwhich is Type 10.

The United State s numbers are arranged so as toindicate the type . For example

,the official registra

tion number of a passenger car will always begin with1 the United States number of a five-ton truck wouldbegin with 5 and so on . Thus you find that the firstregistered passenger car in the A .E.F. i s 1 1 , while the

188 S . O . S .

first registered five-ton truck i s 51 . I f you should see

a truck on the road bearing the United States number

51 2 5 you wil l at once know that it i s a five-ton truck .

Blocks o f registration numbers are periodical ly for

warded by the Di rector of the to the Recep

tion Park for issue to the incoming vehicles . This

registration i s made by a clerk who has a completely

equipped off i ce , including typewriter and card index,in the body o f a five-ton truck which i s located in

many instances out in the open ai r and in the midstof the Reception Park .

Immediately a fter regi stration,al l the equipment

that comes with the vehicle i s taken off and stored in

a reservoir of accessories . This procedure i s just theopposite o f the British method which assigns a driver,helper and all es sential tool s to a truck when it i s

forwarded to France . These two men and the initial

equipment remain with the vehicle unti l i t i s worn out

or destroyed , as they are put out o f commission . Our

personnel on the other hand i s ass1gned from the Pools

o f Casuals which are to be found at every Park .

Every truck has a Log Book which must be kept up

to , date by the drive r. I t there fore becomes thebiography of thi s particular piece o f equipment . The

ti tle of the volume i s the US . Number. I t i s a

complete record o f all transfers, repai rs, and supplies .

The tabulated in formation in these books i s o f great

value to the Statisticians of the Corps . In addition

it i s a form o f publici ty which prevents waste o f

gasolene and spare parts.The US . Num ber is only one detai l of the control


S . O . S .

the location o f what I thought was the hypothetical

number o f a five-ton truck . He wrote the number on

a Sheet o f paper, sent for a messenger and asked him

to get the record o f that number. In less than five

minutes the messenger returned with a typewritten

sheet which stated that the five-ton truck bearing this

actual number had arrived in France on June Ist at

Blank port ; that it had been assigned first to a field

bakery at X then to the Motor Corps at the In

term ediate Supply Depot ; later it was reassigned to

Y. Division , and at that particular moment was in

service in the Toul sector with the Z . Division.

Such is the check that is kept upon everything on

wheels that uses a gasolene engine in France . ! ou

can trace a motor-cycle , a runabout or a kitchen

trai ler with the sam e ease and accuracy.

This i s why the Director of Mechanical Transport

i s enabled to keep his finger constantly on the whole

overseas S i tuation. Every morning General Walker

finds on hi s desk the typewritten Daily Schedule of

Mechanical Transport which gives equipment arrival

at ports the day be fore ; the stocks at Parks ; the total

number of vehicles ordered for service at the front

and at the rear ; the state of spare parts and the state

of personnel . It i s j ust one of the many similar

charts i n use in the various Services of Supply that

express scientific business management at its best .

This is only poss ible because the first link in the chain

of Motor S upply was forged right at the Reception


By thi s time you reali se that the Reception Park

is an important institution . I t not only receives,marks and concentrates equipment but by the nature

o f i ts locati on i s the great Centre of Assignment.When a Divi sion at the front , a Supply Depot, or a

Headquarters anywhere wants a truck or a passenger

car i t makes a requisiti on on the Director at Tours .He knows from hi s Daily Schedule and also from a

Daily Report of Unassigned Motor Vehicles at Bases

and Reserve Parks just what stock he has on hand .

This stock I might add i s known as a Liquid Inven

tory . Through the Assignment Bureau he ordersReception Park to send the equipment desired . Atthe same time the uni t to which i t i s assigned is in

formed . This enables consignor and consignee toget together and know where they are. There i s a

constant flow o f trucks and cars from this LiquidS upply. Hence its name .Wherever you turn in an examination of the Motor

Transport Corps you find some illuminating exampleof co-operation that wil l have its large lesson after

the war. At the Reception Parks, for instance, you

discover the so— called Pooling System— a distinctive

American contribution to war transport standardisation . I t grew out of the basic law o f operating effi

ciency in motor transport which i s that a vehicle must

be worked to capacity both as to time and load .

Every minute that the road wheels of a truck are idlei s a dead loss. Every pound under a capacity load i sl ikewise a dead loss . Certain fundamental operating

rules deduced from these ax ioms are the cardinal

192 S . O . S .

principles under which our whole Army Transport

Service works . They are

Fi rst : Avoid an empty haul . Return loads shouldbe provided for and vehicles should be parked so thatthe least possible time will be lost going to or comingfrom work

,and so that as small a distance as possible

will be travelled with no load .

Second : Load vehicles to capacity. Do not use afive-ton vehicle to carry a two-ton load . Use a vehicle o f appropriate tonnage .Third : Do not use two vehicles to do the work

that one vehicle can do within the required time limit.Work one vehicle ten hours rather than two vehiclesfive hours .Fourth : Reduce to a minimum the time required

in the loading and unloading operations and the extratime required for the necessary upkeep and supplyoperations to the vehicle .Fi fth : Keep the vehicle in constant mechanical

serviceability by constant inspect ion and care of themechanism .

As a result our trucks and cars are pooled wherever

pos sible , which means that at Base Ports, Supply Depots

,and with the armies in the field there i s always

a central reserve of equipment instantly avai lable . It

has eliminated the abuse o f property,useless wear and

tear, and enables all vehicles to be used to the fullestpossible extent. The case o f passenger cars will i llus

trate . With the exception of the highest ranking

officers no officer has his own car. All cars are in a

pool which i s Operated preci sely like a taxi-cab service

with the exception that there is no charge for riding

and the chauff eurs get no tips . When a car i s i ssued


194 S . O . S .

fi fty,i s requisit ioned the Commanding Cflicer at the

Reception Park which i s always at a Base Port in

forms the Supe rintendent o f the Army Transport Ser

v ice that a convoy i s available . Instantly freight is

assigned to i t . Meanwhile each truck i s manned and

equipped ; the cargo i s then put aboard , a so-called

Pi lot who knows al l the truck routes is placed in com

mand , the convoy gets a numbe r by which i t is known

unti l i t gets to its station , and the caravan moves off .

Wherever possible the freight is consigned to the unit

which i s receiving the train . I f thi s i s impossible it

goes to some intermediate point where the trucks are

again loaded for a second lap o f their carrying journey. No time i s lost because the Pilot wires ahead

and a second relay o f freight , with labour necessary

to load,i s ready when he arrives . Every night the

Convoy report s its whereabouts to Tours. Thi s i s

done to permit M .T. Headquarters to divert the train

i f necessary. So complete i s the Truck Convoy Sys

tem that there is a special book prepared for i ts

guidance . I t gives maps showing routes from the sea

to every point o f importance that we occupy in France ;i t shows the location o f gasolene and repair stations ;i t gives concrete di rections how to pack vehicles so as

to use every cubic Inch of space. More than once Ihave encountered these trains winding along the high

ways bearing thei r burden o f freight .Although its functions are many-sided the Recep

tion Park merely represents the first stage in the oversea s career of Mechanical Transport. Equipment i s

not only subj ect to a terrific wear and tear but also

DETRO IT IN FRANCE 195

to the hazards o f enemy action . It must be renewed

and sometimes rebuilt. Hence the Highways o f Supply and Combat are punctuated with a succession o f

Depots known as Service , Overhaul , and Reconstrue

tion Park . Each has its specific work ; together they

keep the Motor Machine fuelled and going.

A Service Park may be installed with combat

troops or behind the lines . In the field i t consi sts ofmobile workships which are motor hospitals on wheels

to which the lame,the halt and som etimes the decrepit

vehicles come under thei r own power for repai r.Often these Parks are set up in a wheat-field or along

side an orchard with little French children as intere sted spectators . Such stations maintain a wrecking

car and crew who bring in disabled and wrecked

vehicles and arrange for evacuating them to the Over

haul or Reconstruction Parks for overhaul i f necessary. In the Base and Intermediate Sections these

Service Parks are installed in permanent structures.

Whether mobile or immobile they carry a l imited

stock o f spare parts, tires, and in some instances maintain a limited Rep lacement S ection o f Motor Vehicles

in order to substitute when necessary a serviceable

motor vehicle for an unserv iceable vehicle when sentin for repai rs .The Overhaul Park

,which is usual ly housed in a

pe rmanent structure , serves two main purposes : i t repai rs and overhauls motor vehicles and parts that donot need rebuilding and also serves as Advance Supply

Depots for supplies,material

,parts and equipmen t.

Every piece of mechanical transport used by the

196 S . 01 S .

American Expeditionary Force must be overhauledperiod ically. It is done at the Overhaul Park .

At the Reconstruction Park you find the real casualti es of transport . Here is assembled the maimed and

battle-scarred equipmen t brought down by rai l for

renewal or rebuilding. ! ou see motor-cycles that

are merely twisted bundles o f steel ; passenger cars

riddled with holes ; trucks that are wire-gashed and

shrapnel-torn . Crimsoning these vehicles i s the good

red blood o f the American doughboys who stuck tosteering-wheel unti l death released thei r grip . All

the tragedy of war i s wri tten in these mute sym bols

o f service and sacrifice . The Reconstruction Park

i s a'

combination o f what the British call a Heavy

Repair Shop and a Salvage Station for vehicles andspare parts . The work done amounts to actual manu

facture and i t i s well worth seeing.


S . O . S .

motor transport repai r and spare part plant in France.It demanded a highly trained personnel

,an immense

amount o f specialised machinery and accessories, and

an experienced and resource ful Commanding Officer.This rare combination was achieved because the j obo f mobili sing men and machines was put up to the

then Maj or, and now Colonel , Harry A . Hegeman ,

one o f the pioneer motor enthusiasts in the army.

Curiously enough he was born at Sparta,W i sconsin .

I f ever a man was a Spartan it i s Hegeman . Big

of bone, t i reless o f energy, a born leader of men

and a glutton for work ( this i s why they cal l him“Bull” Hegeman in the army) , he was the ideal choice.

A Mechanical Engineer by profession , he went intothe army as Volunteer Officer in the war with Spain

and remained there . His service ranges from the

Philippines to Mexico . He had charge o f one of the

first motor truck trains which carried food and sup

plies for the Pershing Punitive Expedition that went

a fter Villa. He knew a good deal about motor trans

port ; now came the opportunity to capitalise his ex

perience , and he did i t in memorable fashion .

His first step was to buy the necessary machinery.

This meant a trip throughout Industrial America . In

purchasing his equipment he met scores of manufac

turers. They had hundreds o f artisans coming under

the dra ft . He said to them :“Save me your skilled

men,

” and they did . The result was the MechanicalRepai r Shop Unit that will be forever famous in the

annals o f the American Expeditionary Force. Thishand-pi cked organisation o f one hundred and eighty

THE MIRACLE MOTOR MAN 199

officers and four thousand men who represent exactly

one hundred and nineteen di fferent trades and occupa

tions has recorded a succession o f feats without parallel in military history.

With its arrival in France difficulties at once de

veloped . Although the organi sation brought hun

dreds o f carloads o f machinery, spare parts and tools,no site had been selected for its plant . Men and material were dumped out at the little town in the North

which i s the Headquarters of the Intermediate Sec

tion . At once the Unit displayed i ts amazing adapta

bility to circum stances . Instead o f waiting unti l a

site was found i t immediately establi shed itsel f i n anold French Cas erne ( a Barracks) where once Napoleon ’ s Legions had lived . In thi s dingy

,draughty

quadrangle including the stables, a Repai r Shop wasset up and in which efficient work was done .Meanwhile a factory site was located thirty miles

from town . Now began the dual l i fe o f the Unit .While one section carried on at the old French Bar

racks the other began to convert the thousand al lottedacres into a modern automobile factory . No army

labour was avai lable and these highly Skilled arti sans

who are supposed to have a temperament as arti stic

and sensitive as an opera singer, unloaded freight carsand per formed the most menial toi l . At the site hun

dreds saw considerable trench li fe but i t consi sted of

digging and levelling ground for roads and cement

foundation-post excavations. Frequently they workedin rivers of mud during the wet season and in fiercesun in the dry. Because Engineers were unavailable

S . O. S .

a detachment of these motor mechanics lai d fire milesof rai lway trackage, including ballasted road-beds ,switches and turn-outs. I t i s typical of the character

of the organisation that the foreman o f the Rai lway

Construction gang was a Chicago druggist who had

joined as office man !

To obtain material for concrete work and road

building it was necessary to dredge sand from the

bottom o f an adjacent river. I t was loaded on a canal

boat, drawn eight miles by mule power, unload ed byhand and trucked to its destination . Fi fty thousand

tons of crushed stone and rock obtained from French

quarri es were handled in the same way. Keep in

mind the fact that during all thi s construction workthe temporary shops at the old French Barracks thirty

miles away were turning out an enormous amount of

repai r and salvage work . Both proj ects were underColonel Hegeman

’

s personal supervi sion . Day and

night he dashed from one to the other in a highpowered automobi le— inspiring

,organising, planning.

Only a man of massive frame , i ron constitution and

indomitable will could have seen the j ob through inthe face of the handicaps that beset him and his l ittle

army of willing workers .In less than sixty days the first imm ense shop— a

fabricated steel structure made in the United Statesand shipped in sections for assembling— rose out o f

that erstwhile wheat-fie ld . Now began the process ion

o f long trains of trucks packed with machine shop

equipment,tools and accessories that found thei r

proper station at last . Before a shop was complete


S . O . S .

institution planned to repai r and renew motor equip

ment has be come a full-fledged manu facturing plant.Months be fore this Reconstruction Park, as i t is

technically known, was a going concern Colonel Hegeman and hi s Unit had become the Handy M en o f the

whole Intermediate Section . No matter what was

wanted the Hegeman outfit could provide i t. This

i s why I called him the Admirable Crichton of Me

chanical Transport . No sooner had he se t up shop

than he faced a shortage in raw material . A largequantity intended for him was caught up in the Service

o f Supply Pool and for the moment was unavailable .

A little thing like thi s did not disturb Hegeman . He

got in hi s car,Skirmished around the country and

bought up all kinds o f metal junk , including aban

doned trunnion bands o f big guns which he convertedinto dies

,gears and steering arms.

Once installed hi s factory became the repository of

requests for every conceivable kind o f article . Upon

one occasion the Signal Corps was in urgent need of

telegraph cross arms and appealed for relie f . Within

forty-eight hours eight thousand arms,converted out

o f undressed lumbe r, were on their way. A whole

fleet o f five-ton trucks was idle because certain steering arms

,unobtainable in France

,had not been shipped

from America . In five days Colonel Hegeman’

s fac

tory turned out five hundred which immediately t e

leased thi s number o f trucks for the front . Thesearms had to be made with dies and hammers praetically manufactured at the plant. A third demandwas for certain commutators which we

‘

re urgently re


quired for ambulances . Five thousand were turnedout in lots of five hundred every three days and as a

result nearly a thousand ambulances were enabled to

be put into service at once. Still another achievementwas the design and construction o f a stock-room on

wheels for use in renewing motor equipment at the

front . An automobi le body designed o f wood and

metal and equipped wi th score s o f compartments to

hold Spare parts and even including a tiny cubby holeo f an office for the clerk i n charge , was mounted on afive-ton chassi s and has been o f great value. The

Tank Corps needed a training tank that would give

the student a reali stic idea o f tank riding and controlso the Hegeman Unit constructed one mounted onrollers that fi lls the bill . The Chie f Quartermaster

wanted the old-fashioned horse—d rawn kitchens im

proved . Colonel Hegem an’

s men equipped them with

truck wheels,springs and bal l-bearings which enabled

them to stand Shock and hard se rvice,thus making

them valuable field ass ets . To turn from serious war

needs to lighter demands let me round out thi s cata

logue o f emergencies met by saying that when no bas eball Shoes were avai lable for the S ix first-class teamsin the organisation thi s astounding institution made

up a hundred pairs which have proved most service

able. You are not astonished when I say that at thetime I write the Reconstruction Park Nine holds the

pennant . This Unit does all things well .Incredible as i t may seem , all this spectacular per

formance has been a mere side issue . The regular

task of the Reorgani sation Park i s to renew battered

S . O . S .

motor equipment . The smashed motor-cycles,pas

senger cars and trucks that come in every day emergeremade and shining. You can follow the progress ofa vehicle from Casualty Section through these cheerful

,humming Shops until i t emerges as good as new.

During the week preceding my vi sit in August 1 , 638

Salvage and Emergency jobs were received and 445o f them were completed . The l ist includes large andsmall trucks ; passenger cars ; motor-cycles and side

cars ; bicycles and animal-drawn vehicles such as Gen

eral Service wagons. To do salvage work i t was

necessary to cope with more than one cri si s. The

Unit found that it had to upholster cars. No multiple cutter to cut trimming was avai lable so one was

manu factured on the premises . The need o f an ad

justable binder to bind leather to celluloid was met inthe same way. The place drips with sel f-sufliciency.

When you visit thi s institution you can scarcelybelieve— save for the presence o f officers in uni form

that you are in an establi shment built by the armyand for the army. Those acres of steel shops with

thei r high roo fs , glass sides and concrete floors that

represent the very last word in industrial construetion and which resound with the incessant ratt le o f

lathe and hammer might be anywhere in America .

Like the great Cities o f Supply that we have rearedit lends itsel f to indefinite expansion . This i s why

every time you come back you see some new annexthat has risen during your absence. I f you want the

full dram ati sati on of Am erican mechanical resource,ingenuity and enterprise abroad you will find it at


206 S . O . S .

unit o f men . This lot of spares i s renewedautomatically at regular intervals. In case of exceptional needs due , for example, to the destruction of a

warehouse o f supplies by fire a requisition i s made by

cable for a complete new stock . Washington has a

complete fi le o f the specific need s of every type of

vehicle used . In addition it has the book catalogue of

spares o f every known truck and vehicle in theA .E.F. I f a cablegram is sent asking for “Ten

X32 362A” i t means that ten steering knuckles com

p le te ly assembled ( right front ) of a certain five-ton

truck are desired . Thus renewal o f spare parts stock ,while involving countless items , i s reduced to a comprehensive and workable basi s .Taking Colonel Hegenian

’

s Central Depot as an

i llustration,we find that although millions o f articles

are carried in stock there i s a separate metal bin for

every item . This bin is care fully labelled and i s in

spected every day. When a Service Park , which car

ries a small stock o f spares,makes a requisition on

the Central Depot for renewal O f stock the Central

Depot in turn automatically replaces the supply byrequisitioning on the Reception Park at the Base Port .In this way insurance i s taken out against sudden

shortages.When you go into the matter of spare parts supplyyou find that in every army certain history repeatsitsel f . This is due to the fact that human nature remains the same whether the person wears a Briti sh ,a French

,an Italian or an American uni form . Most

chauffeurs have a tendency to hoard spare part s.


They know that, as compared wi th other motor carsupplies such as ti res

,spare part s are scarce . With

commendable zeal all desire to keep thei r equipment

going constantly. Hence they resort to al l sorts o f

subterfuges to get a surplus o f spares . In order to

prevent hoarding and to have the least possible drain

on the supply , no spare part i s renewed unti l the old

part i s tendered in exchange . I f the part i s destroyed

and there fore cannot be returned,a complete report

on the manner of destruction endorsed by an office r

must be submitted . All requisitions for Spare part s

must be made out in t riplicate . To prevent mistake s

these requisitions must be v ise'd by an officer at the

garage wherever the truck or ca r happens to bestationed , and who i s supplied with complete Vocabu

laries o f all spare parts . He orders by numbers and

thus the Requisi ti on i s made a s mistake-proo f as possible .

W i th t i res the procedure i s o f course much simpler.A tire i s a ti re . It i s pneum atic or solid . No elaborate

stock o f diff erent types i s required . Our supply in

France i s based on care fully figured out estimates o f

ti re l i fe. Into thi s com putation go such factors asmi leage covered , wear and tear, and the kind o f serv

ice the vehicle is in— that i s,whether it i s passenger or

freight . From these facts,based on previous expe

rience , i s derived an average o f the number o f newtires needed by a truck

,for example

,every month .

This average happens to be two ti res. Thi s numbe r

i s multiplied by the number o f trucks in France andthe result represents the monthly ti re renewal sent

208 S . O . S .

every thirty days . The tires are usually arranged

in long racks that reach to the cei ling of the darkened

warehouses . As little light as possible i s allowed to

shine on these treasure-troves o f rubber which repre

sent a money value equal to a King’ s ransom .

One all-important essential to motor transport oper

ation remains to be descri bed . I mean gasolene which

the British call petrol and the French designate as

essence . To keep the army supplied with “gas” isa tremendous responsibi lity because without thi s li fe

giving fluid al l equipment would be useless . When

you analyse our system you find that it differs in every

detai l but one from the Briti sh . The one common

feature in both armies i s that the “juice” a rrives in

France on tank steamers . The Briti sh then reduce

i t to tin containers o f four gallons each which are

in universal u se . Every Briti sh army motor vehi cle

carries a number o f these cans.

W ith the however, the bulk system i sused , from refinery to front, which means that just

a s we have reproduced a section o f Detroit in automobile reconstruction so do we operate what amountsto a replica o f the Standard O il Company with fuel .

Here the experience of the Reserve Officer againcomes into use ful play because the head of the Gasolene Department— it i s under the control o f the Chie fQuartermaster— is Lieutenant Colonel Charles E.

Dudley, who literally grew up with the world’

s

’

great

est oil corporation and represented it in England be

fore we went to war.At La Pall ice is our Port of Gasolene Entry. Here


2 10 S . O. S .

i s used to supply trucks and cars that work with theCombat Army. Only in the rarest instances i s a tincan used .

The system o f distribution i s so simple and comprehensive that Major Dudleyc an sit at hi s desk at Toursand know all the time just what the Situation i s. Be

fore him i s a huge map on which storage stations are

indicated by red flags. Attached to the map i s a cardbrought up to date every morning and which shows

the quantity o f gasolene in France . The whereaboutsof tank cars i s followed with equal preci sion by meansof a chart showing the railway routes from ports to

the Advance Section . On it the location o f every tank

car is shown by tags. A small green tag indicates the

loaded car while a red one i s the empty car on its way

back to the seaboard .

! ou might know that any American oi l enterprise

would have the inevitable pipe-l ine attachment . Thearmy i s bui lding a line from Havre to the centre of

our gasolene di stribution that will save exactlya day in tanker tonnage alone for the reason that it

will cut down the fuel ship “Turn around” by Six

days. Here you have another conspicuous exampleof American enterpri se overseas. When Colonel

Dudley suggested this pipe-line to the French authoriti es they said i t was impossible .

“But all things are possible with the AmericanArmy,

” was the reply,and the army i s making good .

Thi s undertaking means the laying down of eighty

two miles o f pipe which must cross one of the largesfrivers in France . The material i s not only in process

THE MIRACLE MOTOR M AN 2 1 1

o f construction but some o f i t,together with the

skilled labour that will assemble i t , i s already in

France .

When you come to gasolene statistics you plungeonce more into the arena of bewildering figures . Theaverage allotment i s the five gallons a month for each

man in the A .E .F. It i s estimated that the Amer

ican army in France , as now planned , will consumegallons of motor gasolene from July 1 st,

19 18 , to June 30,19 19 . The Ai r Service alone will

burn up gallons in that time . Kerosene

oil will be used to the extent o f gallons .

The homely but effective item o f castor oil for aeroplanes wil l register gallons while the total

amount o f motor-lubricating oils for trucks,automo

bi les , motorcycles , tanks and aeroplanes will be

000 gallons . A final reminder of the scope of the

army motor operation i s the fact that during these

twelve months gallons of cup grease wi llbe needed .

All motor supplies , whether spares , tires or gas olene ,are easi ly available throughout the Sections that we

use in France . I made a considerable trip by motor

over the Lines of Communication and we were neverat a loss for anything. The chauffeur or driver must

Sign a duplicate receipt for everything he gets . A

carbon Copy goes to hi s unit and i s charged up againsthis car. Following the British precedent every road

i s marked in Signs that proclaim :“Keep to the

Right” or Motor Transport Park Straight Ahead .

”

This far-flung motor-driven machine that I have

2 12 S . O . S .

tri ed to take apart and which often carries the men

and munitions upon which the fate o f battle hangs ,must be kept fit . The periodical overhaul at a Park

wil l not do the job completely for the simple reasonthat day and night— for M echnanical Transport i s always at work— collisions, abuses, or any one o f the

many hazards o f travel on congested roads may 1mpa1rmechanism and the car or truck might fai l in a vital

emergency. Hence a constant inspection o f equip

ment i s necessary .

In command o f thi s Supervision which really supervises i s Colonel Charles Hine

,former Organi sation

Expert o f the Harriman Railway System . He is a

West Pointer who became a freight brakem an after

hi s graduation and worked his way up to a Vice

Presidency. When we came to grips with Germany hewas Ass i stant to the President o f the Baltimore andOhio Railway. Our army Motor Inspection has the

advantage of hi s many years o f experience with steam,

electric and gasolene driven traffic .At best , any kind of inspection i s a thankless task .

The average man who runs a truck for a corporationdoes not l ike to have an eagle-eyed and heartless official descend upon him at unexpected moments andturn hi s vehicle inside out. He resents the process.The whole idea behind Colonel Hine ’ s scheme o f oper

ation there fore i s to reverse the usual procedure andmake inspection welcom e . Thus tact i s the first essential am ong his inspectors , who are all technical menand who can take an automobile apart and assemble

i t with equal ease . Although they have the authority


2 14 S . O . S .

War and who needs no technical teaching. The other

i s the man trained by the army for army Motor

Serv ice .Let us first take the case o f the enl isted man who i s

assigned to the Motor Transport Corps. Immediatelyupon his arrival in France he i s required to fi l l out

what i s known as an Organisation Card on which henot only states his personal history but indicates what

experience he has had with motor vehicles . On the

back o f this Card are the names of thi rty occupa

tions all connected with Motor Transport and rang

ing from assembler in an automobile factory up to

expert driver and skilled mechanic . Each occupation

i s numbered . At the top o f the Card i s a scale o f

these numbers . I f a m an i s a truck driver a l ittle

red clip i s put over number 1 1 — which happens to be

the number of that job. On every other truck driver’ scard a similar marker is placed at 1 1 . When a requisition comes in from a Division or a Park for truckdrivers the Personnel Oflicer simply looks at his File

of Men Available and can see from the number of

red markers how many drivers are in his Human

Pool . As soon as a man is assigned hi s Card‘

goes

into the Assigned Index . He is then caught up in,

the records o f whatever un it he j oins and thus continues to be a cog in the Service Census. As in theBriti sh Army Service Corps, we make every eff ort toemploy men as drivers and mechanics who are unfit

for further fighting. Class B and C men, for exam

ple,who have been wounded but who are sti ll fairly

physically fit,are trained for the Motor Serv ice .

THE MIRACLE MOTOR MAN 2 15

This brings us to the second source of Personnel

Supply, which is the Army Motor Training School .Uncle Sam has set up in France as complete a School

for Chauff eurs as you can find anywhere . It i s run

n ing Colonel Pope’

s famous “Get-Trained-Quick”

course down on the Mexican border a close second

because it turns out drivers ready to take the wheel

in exactly two weeks’ time . The School i s located in

the Intermediate Section a short distance from Colonel

Hegeman’

s Reconstruction Park . The reason for thi s

proximity is obvious . One object of the institution i sto give the students an intimate knowledge o f automo

bi le manu facture . Hence each day a batch of them

drives over in a truck to the shops at the Park,dons

overal l s and takes up station at lathe or forge . Theystudy with the real thing.

The course for drivers includes shop and field work ,i ndividual driving and infantry dril l which i s the training in military etiquette and di scipline . No student

i s permitted to get a certificate from the School of

Instruction unti l he has had a working try-out on the

road . He must prove that he can run a truck on a

crowded highway on a dark night and not lose hi snerve . He must also as semble engines that have beentaken apart and make emergency repairs o f mechani sm purposely put out o f gear.One necessary detai l i s a mastery o f French roadsigns . As in the case of the American . locomotive

engineers our Motor Transport drivers are up againstthe language and traffic customs of a strange country.

In England road traffic tu rns to the le ft instead of to

2 16 S . O . S .

the right as in the United States . In France this i snot true but the highways are literally plastered with

warn ings which must be heeded to escape accident .John Jones therefore must learn that “Virage” means

a sharp turn , that“Cassi s” i s a bad bump ; that

“Ra

lentir” means “Slow Up” ; that Tenez Votre Droit

”

i s “Keep to Your Right, and that “Passage 8

Niveau” i s “Railway,

Crossing.

”

The school course for motor mechanics is for six

weeks and includes shop work o f all kinds . Be fore

a man graduates he must give practical demonstra

tions o f mounting and dismounting vehicles,use o f

machine and bench tools for forging, soldering and

brazing and he must also repai r solid and pneumatic

tires . Most o f these students have worked in some kindo f machine shop be fore . There i s also a six weeks’

course for officers which embraces automobile en

ginee ring, shop management , map-reading and con

voy running.

It only remains to follow Mechan ical Transport up

to the firing line . The moment you get into the Zoneof the Armies you leave the jurisdiction o f the Di

rector o f the Motor Transport Corps and come underthe authority o f the Fighting Chie fs . AS in every

thing else , the Combat troops have first call on motorequipment . Each army exerci se s a supervision of

Motor Operation . Thi s means that there i s a so

called Motor Transpo rt Officer at Headquarters with

each Corps and with every Division . These Offi cersare responsible for the upkeep o f transport which

,in

the field , ranges from , the motorcycle up to the huge


S . O . S .

Unity of Supply i s just as essential as Unity of

High Command .

The whole close-knit American motor machine not

only serves the Fighting Army but i s impressing les

sons of effi ciency and organisation that will reach far

beyond the flaming battle-l ines and have a definite andconstructive eff ect upon the commerce of peace . Chie f

among them i s the Standardisation o f Vehicles . After

a year o f wrestl ing with every conceivable make and

model we have settled down to a definite and orderly

basi s of supply. In passenger cars we are only buy

ing three well-known makes whose worth has been

amply proved . Likewise only two long-established

light delivery trucks will be acqui red while the one

ton truck to be bought henceforth will have the samechassis as our heavy ambulance and there fore the

part s of these two vehicles will be interchangeable .

With one and a hal f and two-ton trucks one make will

be used which will greatly simpli fy renewal .It i s with three and five-ton trucks, however, that

the real achievement in standardisation has been reg

istered . It finds expression in the Liberty Truck

which will go down into history as a worthy work

fellow o f the Liberty Motor that is carrying death anddestruction to German trench and town . It is composed o f parts made by manu facturers who are pro

vided with Government specifications produced by

the Bureau of Standards at Washingt on . Anybodywith a factory anywhere can get these specifications

and make the parts . The Truck there fore becomes amatter of assembling. I f you can standardise hon

THE MIRACLE MOTOR MAN 2 19

esty in the production o f parts you can get a hundred

per cent vehicle and , what is equally important, youwil l solve the whole trying problem of Spare parts

supply . Every part will be interchangeable . The

Army is not concerned with the various argumentsfor or against thi s kind of standardisation a fter the

war. It wants action and the Liberty Truck,like al l

the rest of the Mechanical Transport,delivers the

goods.

IX — The S alvage of Battle

HEN civil isation begins to adjust itsel f to theun familiar sensation o f a world at peace i twill be found among other unexpected things

that War i s not all Waste . The enforced lessons o fthri ft, household economy and popular investment

wil l be fully matched by the extraordinary precedent

established in the conservation of men and material

that can only have a beneficent and constructive eff ecton all future endeavour.In my book “The Business o f War I explained theimmense reclam ation work o f the British Army which

in three years has saved to the Empire more than hal fa billion dollars out o f stuff that would ordinarily

have gone into the scrap-heap . Since that first revelation of the wonders o f war rehabilitation a wholenew atti tude has developed toward what might be

called Battle Uti lity.

Despite thi s astoni shing exhibit o f rehabil itationwrought out o f monster destruction there was a general

,and not altogether unnatural feeling when Amer

ica entered the confl ict that , be ing supplied with al

most unlimited men and money,her Waste would be

prodigal . The exact reverse has been true . Just aswe fooled the Kaiser and hi s fellow prophets who

declared that we would be a negligible factor in the

2 20


2 22 S . O . S .

i ty that has marked the attitude o f our Allies, were

placed at our disposal . Since the former is fairly fa

miliar to most Americans I will use i t for comparison .

At the outset you find that while the method o f Worki s pract ically the same the motive be hind British andAmerican reclamation i s not quite identical . The

first consideration in Briti sh salvage is to save money ;with the United States the foremost consideration i sto save tonnage . The financial end i s use ful but inci

dental . A cubic ton of our Ship space represents more

than so much ordinary cargo-carrying capacity in

times of peace . With us, as I have elsewhere pointedout, Ships are Li fe . We are up against the biggest

transport problem in all military history . Wherever

you turn in an examination of the A .E.F. you findthat tonnage i s the supreme question . Hence our

Salvage grew out of the realisation of the Chie f

Quartermaster that it would rel ieve the strain on ship

ping i f i t were not necessary to give a soldier a brandnew blouse every time the one on hi s back became

unserviceable . So, too , with shoes, belts, haversacks ,rifles and other equipment . The Salvage Service has

reached the point where the tonnage which wouldhave been requi red for the renewal o f all this equip

ment i s employed for commodities such as foodstuff sand ammunition and which cannot

’

be retrieved inlarge quantities .What i s technically known as the Salvage Serv icewas installed as a part of the work o f the Quartermaster Corps . In charge i s Colonel T . B . Hacker,a veteran regular army Quartermaster who took as

THE SALVAGE OF BATTLE 2 2 3

naturally to the job as i f he had been born in a junkshop and had dealt with old clothes instead of hardtack and canned beans all hi s li fe . His office i s inthe same bui lding at Tours which houses the Chie f

Quartermaster,Major-General Harry L . Rogers . Be

fore him i s the great map of the Domain o f Reclama

tion , which i s the usual concrete visuali sation o f

American army work . The Salvage Depots are indi

cated by red and white flags ; the location of SalvageSquads by red flags ; permanent Army Laundries by

black flags ; Portable Laundries by blue ; PortableDeverm inising plants by green ; Field Bathing and

Steri li sing establishments by yellow,and Fat Redue

tion plants by black and white . From this l ist o f sta

t ions you get an idea of the whole comprehensivesweep o f Salvage which not only cleans clothes butlikewise the bodies o f the fighting men .

At the start Colonel Hacker not only had the great

advantage o f being able to adapt the Bri tish systembut he was not forced to labour under the handicaps

which made it impossible for Bri tain to even thinko f salvage unti l nearly a year of war had passed . The

Briti sh had to rush an army into the field almost

overnight . They were up against a li fe and deathemergency and emergency knows no thri ft . Besides ,just as soon as the army caught its breath i t regarded

waste o f food and equipment as part of the soldier’ sli fe . There was always the comfortable reflection

that “The Government i s rich and can aff ord it .”

The Tommy had to be taught to save .Strange as it may seem

,the American soldier

,al

S . O . S .

though part o f a nation of wasters , adapted himsel f

at once to the Salvage idea . He was quick to con

serve everything from a horseshoe nail up to a big

gun . This adaptabil ity has been of immense help to

the Service .A third aid was the obvious fact that we began to

salvage at the top wave o f reclamation development

which finds expression in the Briti sh army in the sav

ing of everything in a pig except that well-known

squeal,and with the French in the use o f the threads

dropped out o f the salvage machines for the manu

facture o f clothing. We knew that in the army rags

are shredded ; that the tops of old socks are made

into mittens ; that scraps o f leather make serviceable

shoe -laces ; and that even the fat i s boi led out o f the

cloths used to wrap up carcasses of bee f while the

goods itsel f i s cut up for wash-rags . The sum of

these trifle s, to paraphrase Michael Angelo , i s the per

f ection of salvage .Just as soon as we had the first semblance of an

army in France we began to impress the salvage idea .

Materi al pi led up but we lacked the machinery withwhich to redeem it . The first problem was to find a

suitable initial plant,which was eas ier said than done.

The Chie f Quartermaster assigned Brigadier General

John F. Madden and Colonel M . J . Henry to this task

and they scoured middle and southern France . Afterweeks of eff ort they located an ideal structure , or rathera ser ies o f structures , in a suburb o f Tours . It was agroup of railroad shops which the French had used

temporarily,

as a Supply Depot .


2 2 6 S . O . S .

the same time. Nothing i s thrown away . The gar

ments incapable o f restoration for the Amer i can troops

are dyed green for our prisoners of war.The reclamation o f shoes— we turn out pairs

of shoes each day at this plant alone — i s typical o f

the methods . The Shoes are washed in big steam rol

ler rubs and a fterwards soaked in oil vats . Mechan

ical processes attach soles and heels . As in the Bri ti sh

Shops the unfit uppers are cut up into laces . No less

labour-saving i s the system o f restoring rubber boots

which are dried by continuous blasts o f hot air a fter

washing. All the torn parts are repaired by expert

tire men .

No detail o f thi s Salvage plant i s more picturesque

than the Laundry which i s the largest in Europe . It

is big enough to do all the SO-called “rough-dry laun

dry work o f a ci ty o f the size o f Dayton , Ohio , and

i s as noisy as a foundry. Its steam-driven batteries

of washing machines and wringers— e ach one with a

capacity o f 450 pieces— turn out articles fromsocks to overcoats . Every day in one month theylaundered pieces . I can give you no better

idea o f the immense value o f these machines than to

say that each one of them does the work of seventyfive women .

This mammoth army laundry i s not without itselement o f human interest . One day last August a

new batch of men was assigned to work in it . Theoff icer in charge l ined them up and said

“I f any one here has had any laundry experience

let him hold up his hand .

THE SALVAGE OF BATTLE 2 27

After a si lence a l ittle yellow private raised his right

hand and timidly stepped out o f the ranks .“Where di d you work !

”

asked the officer.

I had a laundry in San Francisco,” was the reply.

It then developed that he was a Chinaman who had

be en caught in the first dra ft and who is now one of

the mainstays of the laundry . Re-classification will

never disturb thi s yellow brother who i s supremelyhappy on his own working heath .

Salvage Depot Number One,immense as i t i s

,i s

merely one link in the chain of establishments . In the

southern part o f France we have a group o f fou r

Depots which use more than square feet o f

space and employ people . These stations spe

cialise in shoes and are working toward a dai ly outputof pairs. A Harness Repair Shop which in

cludes the repai r o f canvas and web equipment i s a

feature . All together we have nearly twenty Salvage

Depots large and smal l with nearly a milli on square

feet o f working space,and the number will be in

creased as the army expands and as the v i sible supplyo f material grows .These Salvage Depots are j oined by a System o f

Communications which collects and distributes themateri al . This brings us to the really dramatic phaseo f salvage which i s the wreckage of the Combat area .

With the A .E.P. as with the other armies,there are

two kinds of salvage— Battle and Normal . The

former deals with the de'bris o f actual fighting which

may include anything from a haversack to a howitzer,

while the latter i s the re fuse of the Serv ices of Supply

S . O . S .

which means em pty packing cases, ,

tin cans,kegs and

barrels . In both areas kitchen re fuse i s conserved

and employed in many use ful and profitable ways as

you will see later on .

The assembling of Normal Salvage i s a simple mat

ter of gathering up the cast-off waste at Supply De

pots, workshops, training camps , barracks and billet

ing areas . I t i s with Battle Salvage that you get

both the tragedy and trouble . Each army in the field

has a so-called Chie f o f Salvage Service who is

charged with the duty o f supervising the collection o fal l material to be salvaged . Under him are Salvage

Companies who are attached to every Division .

These are divided in turn into Squads who follow hoton the heels of the fighting men . More than once

they have thrown aside bags or shovels or leaped

from collection carts and j oined in the fighting fray.

Field Salvage i s assembled in Advance Dumps

which are preci sely what the word implies . Here

everything is first pi led up without regard to class .

You ‘can se e acres o f coats , blankets , leggings , shoes ,some of them marked with the crimson stain whichmeans that death has been near at hand . Still moreimpressive are the great Metal Dumps which are im

mense stretches o f junk and which give the impressionthat Uncle Sam has gone into the second-hand busi

ness . Steel helmets with their tell-tale holes or deepdents made by flying shrapnel reveal the grim story

of battle.These Dumps in the field or immediately behind aresomething like the Unclaimed Baggage Rooms of a


S . O . S .

stool , began to pound out American rag-time . Outof forty German pianos gathered up after thi s histori c

victory five were of French manu facture which

showed that the barbarians had looted French houses

and even carried away heavy plunder.In the Zones o f the Armies the soldier i s never per

m itted to forget that salvage is one of hi s first obliga

tions . The injunction i s painted— and sometimes in

an am using fashion— on signs that you see every

where. I used to think that the Briti sh salvage re

minders were striking but ours go them one better .

Once , for example, I saw a piece of German equipmentupon which a facetious American had le ft thi s Sign“MADE IN GERMANY ; TO BE SALVAGED

FOR AMERICA .

One o f the frequent signs read : IF YOU DON’T

WANT IT— SALVAGE DOES . Another that

greets you on al l sides is : WHAT HAVE YOUSALVED TO-DAY ! ” A characteristic Sign says :“EACH TON SAVED HERE MEANS A TON

SAVED IN SHIPPING . No injunction i s more

characteri stic of the American spi rit , no less irrepre ss

ible in war than in peace , than the one which proclaims : “IF YOU ARE TOO BUSY PHONE US— AMERICAN SALVAGE . Other salvage signshave these inscriptions : “DROP IT HERE “THIS

IS OUR DUMP— WHERE’S YOURS “PREPARE FOR WINTER— SALVAGE IT .

It used to be the fashion to pay no attention to so

called “duds,which are unexploded shells . They

are now salvaged and add considerably to the ammuni

THE SALVAGE OF BATTLE 2 3 1

t ion supply. Throughout the whole area of the

armies you can find Sign s which urge shell conserva

tion . One o f the most familiar boards reads like thi s“DON ’T WASTE SHELLS . THEY ARE IN

TENDED FOR FRITZ , NOT FOR WASTE .

Material for salvage,whether enemy or American ,

i s removed from the Advance Dump which i s always

in the combat area and conveyed to the Army Dump

which i s located behind the lines and at Rai lheads .

Here the first sorting takes place . Great care is oxer

cised to see that ammunition i s withdrawn from cloth

ing and belts . The property is then care fully seru

tinised to find out i f i t i s fit for immediate i ssue which

i s o ften the case with captured stores . Material and

equipment only sl ightly damaged i s repai red at the

Army Dump which is usually equipped with portable

repair shops mounted on five-ton motor-trucks.Articles which must go to perm anent Salvage De

pots are Shipped by rai lway. Salvage cars are pario f every train that goe s back from Railhead . So ex

tensive has become the bulk o f Salvage that i t has i tsown Regulating Station . During one week in August

exactly 195 cars , containing wrecked material , were

loaded and sent out,and these did not include big guns

and motor transport , which are a considerable item .

Each Salvage Depot speciali ses in reclamations .Clothing, blankets, leggings , rubber and leather equipmen t, underwear, field ranges

,helmets and trench

tools , for instance , go to the vast plant just outs ide o fTours . Range finders, trench peri scopes, watches ,compasses, machine guns and automatic rifles are

S . O . S .

shipped to a huge Ordnance Salvage Station up in the

Advance Section ; medical , surgical , dental, veterinaryand X-Ray instruments go to a highly organised re

pai r shop in Paris ; motor transport , rolling kitchens,bicycles, motor-cycles and wagons are shipped to the

automobile factory somewhere in the Intermediate

Section that I described in the preceding article in

this series . There is a speci al factory for the redemption o f gas masks and al so one for Signal Corps

apparatus which includes radio-vehicles and field telephone and telegraph sets . The salvaging of big guns

i s done in a complete foundry and machine shop that

i s an annex o f the Ordnance Serv ice .The moment that an article

,whether a belt or an

overcoat, arrives at a Salvage Station i t becomes partof a system o f records no less complete than the ma

chine that retrieves it. That i s the reason why at the

Tours Depots , for exam ple , i t i s possible to i ssue every

week a complete and itemi sed statement showing the

amount of property steri lised , washed , salvaged and

returned to circulation . I t indicates the total value

and amount o f material shipped ; the wages pa id ; the

cost of new material used in repai rs and operations

and the relative cost of salvaging material a s com

pared to i ts cost in the American , Briti sh or Frenchfactory. ! ou discover that with the salvaging of a

pair of shoes. for instance , the cost of remaking as

compared with the present war pri ces for new shoes

i s less than one per cent .One phase of Army Salvage deserves a little chapter

all to itsel f because o f the great lesson to peace that


S . O . S .

price i s fixed every six months . At”

the time I write

the p rice pe r hundred-weight of marrow bones was

for first class drippings for butcher’ s

fat for cracklings while the quotati on

on scrap bread was for each hundred pounds .

The proceeds go to the Company ’ s Messes and are

used for luxuries .

Wherever possible the cook i s required to use up hi s

waste products on the premises . When he has an

excess over his own needs he assembles i t in containers

and it i s hauled off to the Field Fat Extracting plants

where i t i s reduced to fat . The material i s treated in

boi ling tanks through which superheated steam is

passed . The fat i s run out , put in barrels and i s pur

chased by the United States Government , which thus

performs for our army the same service that the Com

mittee for the Purchase of Army Camp Re fuse does

for the British .

No army cook in the A .E.F. i s permitted to forget

the fact that America expects every scrap of food to

do its duty. In every cook-house or camp kitchen i s

a big chart which contains the following admoni tion

in large letters at the top“With a view of impressing all un its with the im

portance o f preserv ing and rendering all avai lable fats

the following chart i s issued to Show the source from

which fats can be recovered and the methods of treat

ment . The preservation and treatment of all fats i s

not only necessary from an economical and cook-house

po int of view but i t has become also of national im

THE SALVAGE OF BATTLE 235

portance . These fats are used for ‘dubbin,

’ soap andglycerine to make explosives .”

The chart indicates precisely how recoveries o f fat

are made. First o f all the cook i s shown in simple

text all the sources o f fat which may be obtained from

raw meat, the processes o f cooking, waste bones,re fuse

,or the scrapings from t in cans or meat wrap

pings . He i s also shown how to treat meat and bonesso as to obtain the fat and he i s further taught how

to uti li se i t . Thi s chart i s al so ful l o f help ful hints

for kitchen emergencies . I f there i s no butter, for

example , butcher’ s fat may be rendered down and

used as a substitute . By the same process so-called

trimmings from raw meat may be rendered and used

in baking cakes or biscuits,and so on.

The Salvage System permits no guilty scrap of

food to escape . Even the bakery sweepings are gathered up and sold for $2 a hundredweight whi le the

swil l i s d isposed o f to French farmers who pay 50

cents a barrel for i t . Our empty tin cans,kegs and

barrels are u sed as containers for the fat when it i s

shipped while the flour sacks. are sent up to the frontfor sand bags .Most people will probably be surpri sed to know that

the American Army manu facture some o f the soapthat i s used in France . It i s made out o f the fat ren

dered frOm ki tchen waste . Most of thi s soap i s ab

sorbed by the field laundries which comprise an im

portant branch of the Salvage Servi ce . These laundri es range from a portable Motor Divi sional establishm ent drawn by a tractor which provides power to

S . O . S .

drive the washing machines and transportation as well,

to a huge , permanent plant which washes the lineno f a Base hospital

'with a capacity of beds .The whole process o f reclaiming kitchen waste has

a much larger value than merely saving army food and

adding cash to mess funds . Upon the cook , his helper ,and indeed upon every man in uni form who comes in

contact with this organised economy is impressed at

first hand the lasting virtue o f conservation . He finds

that instead of impairing the qual ity o f the food he

eats thi s uti li sation o f waste improves i t . The lux

uries that he i s enabled to enjoy as a result of thi s

thri ft dem onstrates that saving has its dividends .

When he goes back home a fter the war, resumes civi l

ian l i fe,and goes to grips again with that most eternal

of al l evi ls , the High Cost'o f Living , which may be

even higher than ever,he will be able to adapt himsel f

readily to whatever economic emergenci es may arise .

He wil l be able to make hi s money go further than

ever be fore . Here you have one of the many pe rma

nent compensations o f war.


S . O . S .

worth probably ten times more in a machine gun bat

talion than in a headquarters troop .

The War Department has provided an antidote for

all thi s in the vocational deployment of men through

what i s known as the Personnel System which deal s

with Casuals,the unassigned troops who come from

the United States,and with al l the temporari ly and

permanently unfit soldiers who are shunted from

Evacuation hospitals and Convalescent camm into acentral clearing-house which classifies them according

to thei r mental and physical capabilities . It deals

there fore with casuals and casualties and very properly

may be called a Human Salvage Station .

I f you want to see how thi s extraordinary system

operates you must come with me to the charming littletown o f Blois that overlooks the Loi re . Nature must

have had some vague intimation long ago that in thi srestful verdant nook the maimed veterans of America’ s

Army of Freedom would come for sanctuary and to

get a fresh grip on use fulness . It i s a picturesque

little community with crooked streets and with theusual Cas erne— a quadrangle o f barracks— which i s

now the nerve-centre of our army recuperation .

To this place the able-bodied casuals are sent di rectfrom thei r port of entry into France for assignment.With these so-called Class 'A men who are part of a

replacement dra ft from the United States it is an easy

matter o f assignment to a Combat unit . The bigproblem is with the soldiers who have been wounded

in battle or otherwise injured,who have been dis

charged from hospital and who present just so much

NEW MEN FOR OLD 239

human material to be salvaged for se rvice . It i s wi th

this group that we are chiefly concerned .

Just as soon as a man i s di scharged from hospita l

he must appear be fore a so-called Disabil ity Board

which grades him and recommends the Service for

which he i s suitable . Like al l other armies we have

various Classes . Class A , as I have al ready intimated ,i s men physically fit for combat service . Class B-I

includes men temporari ly unfit for fighting but ablé

to do hard work in the meantime,whi le Class B-2 in

eludes those temporari ly unfit for combat serv ice and

able to do only light work in the interim . Class C I

i s composed o f troops permanently unfit for combat

se rv ice but able to do heavy work in the Serv ices o f

Supply ; Class C-2 comprises soldie rs permanently um

fi t for combat service but able to perform light work

in the Class D men are unfi t for all duty

with the American Expeditionary Force and usual lygo home honourably discharged .

With a knowledge of these various Classes in your

mind you can readi ly se e how difficult i s the task o f

allocating thousands of men , each one with hi s own

l ittle bi t of experience back in the States,which must

be capitali sed to the fullest extent and yet not subjecthim to exert ion or hardship that will impai r hi s heal thor render his man-power unavai lable for the army.

Complicated as i t may seem the whole work of classification and reclassification i s so highly organised thatbetween morning and evening a man can arrive at

thi s Station , undergo thorough examination , obtain

complete equipment and be on the way to a prope r and

240 S . O . S .

suitable station . I have seen Similar systems in other

armies but the American scheme of readjustment leadsall the rest.

These results are made possible by what may be

called a Chute System . The enlisted man who mayhave lost al l his baggage , who has only the clothes on

his back,a freshly-healed wound in his S ide and a most

doubtful state of mind as to what i s to become o f him ,

enters a doo r and by pursuing a continuous path

emerges in a few hours bathed , shaved , fully equipped ,financed

,with bulging barrack-bag in his hand

,and a

l ittle card in his pocket which assign s him to a job

that i s both useful and congenial . He never doubleson his tracks . So thorough i s the automatic trans

formation that i t sometimes seems like a dream to the

men who have been through this most humane of all

mills . L et us now see how it works .Thi s Chute which i s for al l the world like the

famous animal run-way in “Packingtown

” in Chicago

i s located in a large bui lding known as the Classifica

tion Barracks . All enlisted personnel enter in Single

fi le . Each man carries in his hand the Report of theD i sabili ty Board that has examined him and whichstates hi s name

,number

,army unit ; the nature o f hi s

di sabili ty and whether i t existed before or a fter heentered the arm y ; hi s classification , that i s whether he

i s Class B or C ; and the nature of the duty recom

mended for him by the Board . He is now handed asheet of paper— an Inspection Slip— which containsan itemised list of what will happen to him on hi s

j ourney down the Chute. As these things happen they


S . O . S .

a glance how many men he has available for every job.

The Qualification Record filled out,our man now

continues his j ourney down the Chute. The next stat ion i s the Pay Department . Many men leave hospital

without a cent. In order that they have some pocket

money each man is given an advance o f on hi s

pay. After financial needs are met assignment i s

made to Companies by physical qualifications . Thi s

means that all B-I men would be put in one group .

Each man i s given a Barrack Bag which he presents

at a miniature Department Store where it i s fi lled with

clean underwear,socks

,field shoes

,razor

,tooth brush

and paste,and where he al so gets the dai ly ration of

tobacco . Adjoining i s a bath-room where , with soap

and towel provided at the Equipment Counter, he

cleanses himsel f from head to foot . AS a final touch

he can , i f he so desires, end this remarkable overhauling journey by sitting down in an American barberchair in a sanita ry barber-shop and have his hai r cut

or hi s face shaved be fore emerging a new man .

Now you can understand what I meant when I said

that more than; one soldier has believed that the Chuteprocess was a dream . Despite its thoroughness exactly l twelve hundred men have been classified in these

Barracks in a single day. The moment that the manemerges he i s marched off to the Barracks, put incharge of a Non-Commissioned Officer who issues a

Travel Order which indicates hi s destination . Froma Location Slip he knows for the first time that he i s

to go to Salvage Depot X ,let us say, and that he i s

to start at 8 o’clock the next morning. In the mean

NEW MEN FOR OLD 243

time he has an opportunity to stretch hi s legs ; l i stento a band concert composed of temporari ly unfit sol

diers or even watch a boxing bout which is one o f the

great entertainment features every evening. In sum

mer a basebal l game i s one of the daily diversions .

This Human Salvage Station is a gold-mine o f inci

dent that reveals the character o f the American soldier.

Here i s a typical case . When a Casual Company i s

sent off in a body the Travel Order sometimes con

tains a hundred names with considerable data a fter

each one . Four copies must be made— all by hand .

One night the officer in charge o f the Classification

Barracks , Lieutenant William R . Quinn , was told thattwo brothers , both wounded at the same time and

devotedly attached to each other,were to be separated .

The Travel Order which divorced them contained a

hundred and fourteen names and had just been writ

ten and distributed . These boys did not want to be

separated . In order to keep them together i t was

necessary to rewrite the Travel Orders which wouldmean hours of work. The Barracks clerks hadworked from o’clock in the morning unti l

at night every day for weeks,yet when Lieutenant

Quinn stated the facts every man volunteered to

t e-write the papers in order that these two brothersmight remain together . This perform ance has been

duplicated several times . I t disclosed the fact thatthere are hundreds o f groups of brothers in the

A .E.F. Frequently you find three,even four, m em

bers of a family in the same unit .Here i s another instance o f character. One day

S .,O . S .

a little Marine hardly up to the minimum require

ments o f height and weight Showed up for classification . He had been badly gassed and wounded .

Having been a stenographer in New York , he wasattached to the clerical force at the station . A few

days’ work,however

,convinced the officer in charge

that he could not stand the indoor labour so he was

given light outdoor duty. One night he approached

a comrade and asked i f he could borrow a hundred

francs .“What do you want to do with this money ! ” asked

his mate .“ I want to beat it (Absent without

leave ) , shoot across France and j oin my outfit in thetrenches

,was hi s reply .

This bantam who sti l l had the German poison in

hi s system and who was physically unfit to do a ful lday’ s work was wi lling to break the rules

,subject

himsel f to a Court Martial in order to get back to

the fighting front .On another occasion a young boy o f Austrian birth

was making hi s way down the Chute . He sti ll l imped

from a wound in hi s leg. At the Vocational Desk

the 1Officer asked him“Are you an American citizen ! ”

Yes,replied the boy with pride . A German

bullet made me one .”

During my visit to the Station I overheard a characteristic conversation between two men who had

j ust been evacuated from hospital . They were both

of German origin . One of them asked the othe r


S . O . S .

cance than merely adapting permanently or temporari ly unfit men to an army j ob. It is preparedness for

the future . Nothing wears out men like war andno war like thi s war. Out o f this process will emerge

tens of thousands o f men better equipped for peace .

It i s making our overseas force an army of special ists .

Full brother to the insti tution that I have just triedto describe is the great American “Blighty” which i snow being established nearby. After four years of

war the average American need scarcely be told thatBlighty means England for the Briti sh Tommy.

When one o f them gets a “blighty it means that i t

i s a sufficient wound to take him back home . Amer

ica wil l not be able to send her wounded men home

so she will bring the com forts o f home to France .

When the first American Casualty Reports were

flashed by cable from France to the United States

there leaped from many American hearts and homes

the Swift and tremulous question :“What i s the army doing for my wounded boy !

The huge Recuperation Camp on the Loire i s the

army’ s answer to thi s question . Amid woodedgroves and with every convenience that makes li fe

worth redeeming is rising thi s sanctuary where the

doughboy can come from Evacuation Camp and

travel grate fully back to strength . The only detai l

mi ss ing will be the loving presence o f hi s family. It

wi ll be a sort o f Army Elysian Field on Earth . Asidefrom the human aspe ct thi s imm ense project i s a

sound military and economic enterpri se for the rea

son that the average cost in time, eff ort and sub

NEW M EN FOR OLD 247

si stence of each individual evacuation from a hospital

camp to th is haven o f rest and recovery i s much less

than the Similar cost of individual replacement from

the United States. It mean s New M en For Old

without drawing on the reserves at home .

So far I have dealt wi th the classification of en

l i sted men . Now we come to the kindred allotment

o f officers which brings us to the threshold o f the

Military Confessional , in many respects the most

unique and original human instituti on in the wholeA .E.F. Save to those who have found hope, faith ,and a new li fe within its sympathetic wal ls i t i s

scarcely known . Yet this establishment stands at the

cross-roads of the sometimes tangled highway of

army li fe and po ints the path to fresh careers. It i s

a l iving rebuke to the old theory that War i s a bru tal

and unsympatheti c thing. I know o f no activity

which more completely or unalterably reflects theideals of the American Army.

With officers, as with men , square pegs are oftenstuck into the round holes . In other words the wrong

man i s put on the j ob and makes a hash of it. In

most other armies the man found to be temperam en

tally unfit to lead troops or even for some desk task

is o ften sent home . He feels that.

he i s di sgraced

and he frequently spends the rest o f hi s li fe eatingout hi s heart in remorse and regret. He makes himsel f a marked man and hi s use fulness to society

,in

most in’

stances, ends . With the A .E.P. such a man

i s given a chance to make good . Regeneration i s put

squarely up to him . The story of how this oppor

S . O . S .

tunity i s off ered li fts the routine and the humdrum

of so-called Reclassification to the realm of a real

romance . I t is genuine character bui lding.

The first question that naturally ari ses i s : How

are these officers segregated ! The process i s very

simple. A S soon as i t became apparent that officers

were misplaced in the various Staff Corps and De

partm ents ( such misplacement was inevitable in the

hasty mobi lisation o f a huge army ) , a Personnel Eu

reau was establi shed at the Headquarters of the

Services o f Supply at Tours to deal with all problems

relating to Officers physically or otherwise unfit for

front-l ine work and to give them a chance elsewhere.

It was placed in charge o f a Deputy Chie f of Staff

who by the very ci rcumstances of his birth , hi s whole

army experience and his outlook on l i fe was an in

spired choice . This man i s Lieutenant-Colonel M . R .

Wainer,whose story is as picturesque as his post. He

was born in Russia and was brought to America asa chi ld by hi s immigrant father who settled in the

Middle West. The boy yearned to be a soldier ; it

was impossible for him to go to West Point so he

enli sted as a private and worked hi s way up to acommission . He has journeyed over the rough places

himsel f ; he knows and understands men ; he was

there fore eminently qualified to assume the role of

Father Con fessor to the Army, for such he is .It was not long be fore the di sc iples gathered at

his doo r. They came because a certain memorandum

was sent to all Bureau Ch iefs. This document socom pletely dramati sed the spiri t of fai r play and a


S . O. S .

All officers ordered for this reclassification are first

ordered to the Human Salvage Station which I de

scribed in a prev ious section o f this article . The

papers giving the available data as to their qualifications

, ciVil occupation and the reason for their relie f

are then sent to the Commanding General o f the

Services of Supply. Upon receipt of these papers

the Personnel Bureau at Tours orders the officers to

report there . Upon arrival they are required to fi ll

out an Officers Qualification Card , which is somewhatsimilar to the Qualification Record fi lled out by the

enlisted man although i t does not include the voca

tional li st . It contains the usual personal in forma

tion . The officer himsel f indicates the Department

or Branch of the Service in which he thinks he would

be most valuable and hi s qual ifications for the work .

He must also state what educational advantages he

has enj oyed ; what foreign languages he can speak ,and state any previou s army service.Every officer who comes to Tours for reclassifica

tion has an interview with Colonel Wainer which is,i n many respects , the most important detail . Beforehe enters the Con fessional the Colonel has read the

man ’ s record . He can therefore talk to him with

knowledge and authority. More than one officer hasentered that sanctuary cocky, even defiant, and pro

testing against what he regards as an indignity. Al

ways he emerges with a smile on his face and withhope in his heart . This big-souled Deputy Chief of

Staff who rose from the ranks knows how to place

men. He has be fore him an up-to-date li st o f needs

NEW M EN FOR OLD 2 51

in the Services o f Supply which grow so fast that

there i s always a demand for officers. He i s there

fore able to assign m en to j obs where they are sorely

wanted and where the welcome,first born o f need

,i s

a stimulus . The demand for officers, I might add ,usually exceeds the supply. No matter what highly

specialised experi ence is represented there i s invari

ably a place to use i t.

A complete card record i s kept o f every officer reclassified for incompetency or temperamental unfitness . For the purposes o f army records he i s known

as a Thrown Back” or a for Short . Like

that other and more deadly T.B.

”-the Great White

Plagueh -he can usually be cured . Thi s card system

i s itse l f a marvel o f completeness and efliciency . A

card wi th a green flag in the centre, for example,signifies an officer reclassified for physical reasons .A card with a blue flag in the upper right-hand cor

ner shows that i t i s the bri e f biography o f a

sent back from the front for temperamental reason s.All reclassified oflicers are placed in four divi sions.Class 1 i s composed o f those who

,while rendering

satisfactory se rvice, have requested thei r own trans

fer for personal reasons. Class 2 are Misfits whohave failed to render efficient serv ice and who are

not sufficiently inefficient to justi fy an Elimination2

Board . Class 3 includes al l officers for whom an

Elimination Board has recommended a. transfer toanother branch o f the Service . Class 4 i s officerswhose di scharge has been recommended by the Elim i

S . O . S .

nation Board but who are being given another chanceto quali fy somewhere in the army.

Since I have re ferred to Elimination Boards it may

be wel l to explai n their function,which I will do with

a concrete example. I f the reclassification of an offi

cer sent back from the combat area for inefficiencyindicates that he holds too high a rank for his new

post in the Services o f Supply he is ordered be fore anElimination Board with a vi ew to hi s demotion to a

grade more nearly in accord wi th hi s capability or

to con form with hi s di scharge i f a dismi ssal i s recom

mended . Thus the Board ’ s j ob i s to el iminate or toappraise men and ranks .

Some officers have appeared several times be foreElimination Boards . This procedure is in l ine with

the poli cy outlined at General Headquarters , which isthat no officer shall be discharged from the service o f

the United States except for misconduct or some simi

lar reasons and unti l he shal l have been given every

possible opportunity to prove hi s fitness in anycapacity . No man was ever di smissed from theA .E .P. without good and sufficient reasons and only

after he had had every chance to redeem himsel f byserv ice. In thi s Spiri t o f justice you find the incarna

tion o f the character of the grave-eyed man who isthe Commander-in-Chie f of our Armies abroad .

Reclassification o ften develops the fact that m en

fai l in the army merely because they are put on awrong task . I f i t is apparent that an Aviation officerlacks the fundamental qualitie s requi red in thi s branchof the Service , and his training, civi l occupation and


S . O . S .

that second chance and who have found both glory

and compensation in thei r remaking.

One day a southern Colonel entered the Army Con

f essional. He had arrived in France in charge of

a sple ndid battalion . In the training camp he gave

every evidence of ski l l and tact . The moment he

got his troops up in the combat area he displayed a

temper and inabi li ty to handle men in an emergency

that not only made him conspicuous but led to hi s

being ordered back for reclassification .

This man was proud and sensitive ; he had be en in

the National Guard for twenty years ; all thi s time he

had dreamed o f the hour when he would lead troops

in actual battle . When that great moment arrived he

was found to be temperamentally incapable and no

one realised it more than he did . All that he could

see ahead of him were years o f poignant regret an’d

bitterness . Instead o f rebuke he met with kindness ;where he had expected reproach he found a helping

hand .

“What would you like to do ! ” asked Colonel

Wainer.“I want to do a man ’ s job somewhere in France ,

was the reply.

He got his chance . At a certain port much used

by the American Expeditionary Force you will find

thi s Colonel erect , buoyant, full of pride in hi s task

and likewise a pride to the uni form he wears. He

has found the soci al field in which hi s personal ity

has full swing. He i s merely one of many splendid

NEW MEN FOR OLD 2 55

men who have found themselves a fter devious army

wandering.

The Army Confessional knows neither caste,creed

nor colour. Not so very long ago a negro offi cer

was sent back from the front as unsuited for combat

work . He was so indignant that he had done thatmost rare of al l army things— sent in hi s resignation .

Colonel Wainer knew that the man had character and

that i t only needed to be pricked into li fe so he asked

him point-blank :“Are you sti l l loyal to your country and your flag !

”

Yes, responded the man ,“o f course I am .

Then you Should be willing to serve it in the best

way that you know how ,

” retorted hi s questioner.To-day that officer who was willing to quit the

serv ice in a fit o f pique and face rebuff at home i s

rendering admirable service with a Stevedore regi

ment where hi s men almost idol ise him and where hei s a credit to his race and his cause .

These heart-to-heart experiences are not without

thei r element of humour as the case of another negroofficer will Show. When Colonel Wainer asked him“What i s your trouble ! ” he immediately replied !

Well , boss, i t’

s thi s way.

” His first words o f

course showed that he had fai led in the first principlesof military requirem ents and that he was still a waiteron a Pullman dining car. When the proposition of

serving hi s country was put squarely up to him hewas ready and willing to go be fore an Elimination

Board and serve in the ranks as a private soldier. He

has been in the thick o f the fray ever since.

In this Con fess ional human nature stands uncom

promisingly revealed . Men blame every one for thei r

errors save the right person who usually i s them selvesFrequently they protest that it was not ineffici ency

that brought them back from the front but because

they happened to be in a regiment composed o f m en

from various States and that the predominating offi

cers in ’ the unit want subordinates from thei r own

Commonwealths under them . These cases are in

variably without foundation because inves tigation

proves that the Officer himsel f i s to blam e and that hehas not given the proper support and loyalty to hi s

Commander. Such men are assigned to duty in theServices o f Supply where

,relieved from the friction

engendered by sensitive State pri de , they have given

excellent accounts o f themselves.Again and again there are examples of m en merely

misplaced . A young man o f twenty-five who had

been a success ful commercial painter found himsel fin a Field Battery and was sent to a school for in

struction and training in the intricate and mathe

matical problems o f arti llery. Of course the work

was not congenial and he was sent to the rear for

classification . His proper station was Camouflage , to

which he was as signed and where hi s special qualifi

cations have already won him the highest praise . It

i s a typical i llustration of the work that is being donedaily in making the army more keenly fit to do its

great task .

When you sum up the whole process o f reclassifica

tion you find that, as with so m any other phases of


X I— The M arvols of A rmy Organisation

F you should arrive in France and want to know

at once the whereabouts o f your Son,brother or

friend from your home town who i s with an

Am erican unit somewhere in the field , all that you

have to do i s to get in touch with the Central Records

Office of the A .E.F . and you can find out as quickly

as the telegraph can transmit your inquiry and flash

back an immediate answer. This personal intelli

gence system i s just one more detai l in the many-sided

army organisation that i s a marvel o f efficient co

ordination .

We have been j ourneying through the major andthere fore spectacular Services o f Supply . S ignifi

cant as are their activities , they only comprom ise acomparatively few sections of that vast and throb

bing domain which feeds,equips, and unifies the over

seas forces. We can now take up some o f the otherand no less vital agencies which form what may be

called the subsidiary corporations o f the AmericanBusiness o f War, Unlimited . They range from a

li fe insurance company to the largest real estate oper

ating office in the world . Included among them is aSchool for Citizenship , a complete Renting and Claim

agency,a scientific Forestry Service, a job-printing

plant,even a full-fledged newspaper of , by, and for

258

MARVELS OF ARMY ORGANISATION 2 59

the army. Each in its way reveals a distinct phase

o f highly developed admini stration that i s not only

essential to some phases o f the conduct o f the confl ict

and the mental or physical upkeep o f the men , but

conveys a use ful and constructive lesson for peace.The Central Records Office i s typical . We put

the Card Index on the Commercial Efficiency Map .

Hence no one will be surpri sed to learn that we have

probably the largest one ever created and comprising,when you consider all ranks

,civi lians , prisoners o f

war,and other individual s connected with our over

seas forces , more than two million names . This

monster and up-to-the-hour directory makes it pos

sible to locate every person who draws pay or prop

erty from the army and to know at a glance his or

her past and present .

You find thi s huge institution housed in an im

mense structure in a pleasant town well up in the

Intermediate Section . Here, hundreds o f“Waacs ,

”

working as clerks and stenographers , per formthe same admirable service for the American Army

that they do for the British Expeditionary Force in

that they release fit and semi-fit men for the front or

for service in the Supply and Transport branches .

At first sight the establishment makes you think o f

a Census Office , and such it really is . You hear themachine-gun-l ike rattle of batteries of typewriters ;you see apparently unending vistas of Card Catalogue

Cabinets ; there i s the charged atmosphere o f swi ftand orderly action . All these Cabinets are in groups

by Army Corps,Divisions

,and smaller organisations.

2 60 S . O . S .

Each Cabinet be ars a card which indicates the bodywhose records it contains .

Central Records , as it i s more commonly known ,

i s technically charged with “maintaining accurate and

complete records o f the entire personnel of the Ameri

can Expeditionary Forces,civi lians attached thereto ,

all the American prisoners o f war held by enemy

forces and al l enemy prisoners o f war held by our

forces .” This bald and more or less official outline

o f responsibi lities covers a multitude o f other detai ls

that extend from the entry o f the army individual into

this world to the final record o f his passing into the

next.To accomplish all thi s the office is divided into vari

ous Divisions. Some of these Divisions are so large

that they in turn are composed of three or four sec

tions. Each has its separate and distinct function .

The Mai l,Record and Correspondence Divisions wil l

i llustrate . It not only opens, distributes, and fi les

army correspondence for record,but conducts the

courier serv ice which daily conveys official documents

from one Serv i ce to another. Likewise it handles,collects and repl ies to inquiries about the Overseas

forces.The Card Index of the army personnel i s an il

lum inating example o f how Central Records works .

Its main obj ect i s to provide what is known as a

Master Card for every person connected with the

A .E .F. It i s no simple task . New units are arriving

in France every day— indeed every hour. They come

from every part o f the United States . Men are con


2 62 S . O . S .

number in the army register . Henceforth

in all records of John Jones overseas that number will

accompany him even to the identity disc that he wears

attached to a string around his neck .

This brings us to the preparation o f the Master

Card which i s the compact and concrete record o f the

soldier . This card i s eight inches long and five inches

wide . It contains the full name , army serial number,rank

,organisation

,complete home address ; name, re

lationship and address o f party to be notified in case

o f emergency ; date o f bi rth ; place and date of en

listm ent or commission , date o f arrival in Europe ;location in France or elsewhere abroad ; record of

all trans fers and changes which includes every prom o

tion,capture

,absence wi th or without leave or fur

lough . It also states the individual’

s occupation be

fore the war. In the lower right-hand corner i s a

blank square that has a grim and tragic Significance.

It‘

i s the spot le ft for the photograph , diagram , or

description o f the place o f burial .

On the back of the card and under the head o f Hos

pital Record i s space for the record of every wound ,i llness

, or physical incapacity o f any kind . It shows

the date o f the casualty,the hospital where the soldier

was sent,the nature of the i llness or wound ; whether

it was slight or serious and the hour and date when

the trooper was discharged or died . When you ex

amine‘

one o f these Master Cards there i s preciouslittle o f vital importance about the soldier that you

do not know. So complete i s thi s Card Index that

i f you asked to see the record o f the Commander-in

MARVELS OF ARMY ORGANISATION 263

Chie f you would discover that it followed the same

form as the card o f Bill Brown , buck private in the

X D ivision .

W ith the machinery at the disposal o f Central Rec

ords it i s comparatively easy to make out the original

Master Card . The problem i s to keep thi s card“l ive ,

” as they say i n business . This i s achieved

through the co operation o f every unit in the A .E.F.

which i s required to submit all casualties and changes

in the status o f i ts personnel to Central Records at

regular intervals. From these reports the various

changes are made on the Master Card .

Two D ivisions o f Central Records have special and

poignant interest . One relates to Casualties which I

shall describe later on in this book in connection

with Graves Regi stration . The other i s that section

which deal s wi th American prisoners o f war held by

enemy forces. As i s the case with every other detai lof the war, whether i t involves the capture o f a townor the record and treatment o f prisoners , the Allies

di splayed an infinitely larger spiri t o f justice and

fai r-play toward thei r enemies than the enemies

showed toward them . The German military authori

ti es took a particular delight i n intensi fying the suspense o f relatives and friends over the fate o f those

reported missing. Only those who have been through

thi s long-drawn angui sh can realise what it means

to be kept in the dark concern ing the whereabouts o f

loved ones. The phrase “wounded and mi ssing,”

has whitened more hairs and racked more souls than

al l the defini te news o f death in action combined .

S . O . S .

Under the international agreement the ordinary

method of conveying information about prisoners ofwar is through the Red Cross. Central Records com

piled the names o f every German prisoner in our

hands and they were sent expeditiously to the German

Government by way o f the accredited channels. The

system of the American Business o f War operates

alike for fri end and foe . Hence you find a Master

Card for every Boche in our hands . The German

has not been so considerate o f our own men . Their

much-vaunted efficiency has no heart .

The deeper you probe into the Business o f War

the more you real ise its intimate parallel with every

day commerce . War these days is simply colossal

merchandi sing with men . Instead o f convert ing rawsteel into rai ls or gi rders i t transforms the raw human

being into a finished fighting man . To maintain

its output every industrial concern must renew its

machinery regularly to meet the wear and tear of

incessant production . In the same way the army

must renew its fighting machine , which is the soldier.Every day i ts ranks are thinned by enemy action ,accident , disease— any one o f the many peri ls that

beset a huge force in the field . This army renewal

i s technically known as Replacement o f Men , and i td iscloses another phase of scientific mili tary organi sa

tion well worth explaining.

All new men for the American Expeditionary Force

whether they are combat troops or i n the Services o fSupply mainly come from the same source, which i sthe draft. Likewise the great majority get their pre


2 66 S . O . S .

men ready. Through the draft he keeps on deposit

ing men in the hum an bank , which i s the army at

home . Hence the army must keep books on men just

a s i t keeps books on everything else.

All thi s means that General Headquarters i n France

must know exactly how many men are available in

Ameri ca all the time . Hence you can see up there

a blue chart which shows every Division in the Amer

ican Army at home and abroad . The units in Amer

ica are indicated by a white square. The moment

that thi s unit arrives in Europe a smaller square i s

placed inside. A glance at thi s chart shows what

troops are at home and what are overseas . The

process which regi sters these results i s packed with

detai l and registers high tribute to our organising

gen ius.

Let us begin at the beginning , which means that

the machinery o f supplying men for France starts

with the Section o f the General Staff known as G I

whose functions I described in a previous chapter and

which is the Great Army Provider. Every requisi

tion for men,l ike every requisition for food

,clothing

,

engineering material or equipment , must pass across

its d esks . Although the G1 at General Headquarters

i s the senior Section and has general authority in

requi sitioning men,the G4 o f the Services of Supply

also has a‘

responsible task be cause every man that

sets hi s foot on French soi l comes under its jurisdic

t ion first. G1 at G .H .Q . gets him to France and G4o f the equips

,transports him to hi s training

MARVELS OF ARMY ORGAN ISATION 2 67

area and gets him up to the front where he comes

under the authority O f G .H .Q .

In order to get at the very first step in Human

Supply we wil l be obliged to step out of the A .B.E.

for a moment. It takes us to a charming little town

in France which wi ll be a post-war shrine for the

reason that in a simple structure on a side street sits

the Master Strategist,Marshal Foch

,the Hammer o f

the Hun . With him i s vested the Supreme Unityof Command of the Allied armies and especially those

fighting in France . He moves the pawns on the

checker-board O f li fe and death because all majororders for troop movements emanate from him . I ti s Foch who determines what men are needed for

offensives and thi s in turn determines the number of

men required to equip,supply and transport them .

Thus the Human Demand so far as the American

Expeditionary Force i s concerned,really begins with

Foch in conjunction with General Pershing.

Let us say for t he sake of i l lustration thatmen comprise the monthly shipment to France. This

number includes two separate and di stinct groups.

One i s the regular, normal addition to the army ; the

other includes the men needed to renew losses at the

front or in the rear and i s the so-called Replacementforce .

This again brings us bang up against the supremeproblem O f the A .E .P.

— Tonnages — which applies tomen no less than it applies to material . Every unit

in France wants all the men it can get . Norm al increase and Replacement there fore become matters O f

S . O . S .

care ful tonnage allocation and G1 at G.H .Q . doe sthe allocating. First o f all both Front and Rear filethei r requisitions O f human needs . I f the army has

be en in a big O ff ensive its demands are greater thanusual because i t has had casualties. In the same wayi f vast new construction proj ects in the Base or Inter

mediate Sections have been launched and must be

pushed through to early completion there i s an ah

normal requirement for additional Engineering units .

I f the demand for men at the front has made i t neces

sary to send men from the S O S . up into the fighting

l ine they must also be rep laced . The emergencies

that beat about Supply and Replacement are manyand complicated . G I S i fts out al l these needs and

does precisely what the Chie f Quartermaster doeswith regard to hi s tonnage allotment . It makes up

a Priority Schedule which indicates the urgency ofthe human shipment. This Priority Schedule i s

based on a fixed arrangement called Schedule ofPriority o f Shipments” and which i s the Convoy

Bible. I t i s divided into Phases. Each Phase in

cludes a certain number o f troops for the Combat

Army and a certain number for the Services o f Sup

ply. In Priori ty, as in everything else , you ~reali sehow all-important the i s because there can be

no fighting at the front without thi s unspectacular

and blood less fighting in the rear.

One reason why an up-to-the-hour check can be

kept on Replacements i s that for every unit in France

there i s a chart which shows the strength o f the or

ganisation. Le t me illustrate with the case of a Di


2 70 S . O . S .

less system of scrutiny. The War Department advi ses G I by cable the preci se number and class o f reg

ular organisations and the total numbe r O f casual sembarked and on the way. The whole process now;

becomes vi sualised . I f the convoy includes A Div i

sion which i s intended for B army in the field there

i s already a blank square for this Division on the B

Army Chart O f Organisation which hangs at General

Headquarters . S O long as thi s Divi sion i s in America

this space i s white . The moment it start s for France

hal f O f the square i s fi lled in with red . As soon as the

unit arrives in France the square becomes all red .

Meanwhile G1 has advised the armies in the field or

the Services O f Supply just what troops are on the

way in the same way that the Quartermaster Corpsor the Engineering or Ordnance Services are advisedof the shipment o f needed supplies . This complete

system O f advice makes for an efficient use o f manpower in the army.

The remarkable document known as the Daily S tateObtains with human as with material needs. Every

day there i s placed on the desk O f the Commander-in

Chie f at G .H .Q . and on the desk of the CommandingGeneral O f the Serv ices of Supply at Tours a type

written sheet which shows the total personnel— Combatant and Services O f Supply— in France ; the ar

rivals during that month ; and the total debarked the

day be fore ; the monthly Human Demand ; what hasarrived ; what i s at sea , and the balance to come .

Scientific supervision can do no more !

Just as soon as troops— whether assigned to Com

MARVELS OF ARM ! ORGAN ISATION 271

bat organisations or Replacements— arrive in France

they come under the administrative di rection of G4.

I f they are intended for the Services Of Supply they

go where the Commanding General S .O .S . directs ;i f they are headed for the front they are dist ributed

by order o f G3 which i s the Operations Section at

G .H .Q . and which controls fighting. Combat troops

arriving in uni ts go at once to a training area for

further training or to Barracks or Billets for a brie f

rest be fore going up to the Zone o f Advance.Since we are mainly concerned with Replacements

and more especially Replacements in the Services of

Supply we can now follow them through . All Replace

ments are casuals and are usually sent to so-called

Depot Divi sions which may be anywhere in the do

main O f the S OS . and which are Often training cen

tres. These Depots are for both officers and men.

The men are kept in Pools and are withdrawn as

the army needs or emergencies dictate . Each ArmyCorps , i t i s interesting to add , i s requi red to keep aso-called Replacement Battalion which provides an

accessible and immediate source O f renewal to meet

any contingency. This battalion i s l ike the reservesupply o f food and equipment kept at Railhead . I t

may never be needed but when it i s needed it i swanted in a hurry.

It i s vitally important that a complete record be

kept O f every soldier available . This means that at

Tours you can see one of the most remarkable mapsthat the war has produced . I call i t The Great Human Map o f the for such it i s . It shows

272 S . O . S .

every section in France occupied by American troops .Red tags indicate Art illery ; white , In fantry ; grey,Mechanical Transport Units, and so on. In order to

distingui sh the two grand Divisions there i s a pink

mark on the tags of troops and a purple square

on the cards O f the Combat troops. On each tag i styped the brie f biography

,in terms of strength and

movement, of the unit from the moment i t landed inFrance up to the present time .Why is thi s map necessary ! I will tel l you . Whenever G1 at G .H .Q . needs men for Replacement it simply asks the Adjutant General o f the Servi ces of

Supply— Colonel L . H . Bash—“What have you ! ” and

he can immediately supply the need . He does not

look at the map, however. Thi s map epitomises aremarkable Card Index which i s part of the Adju

tant General ’ s Office. There i s a card for every unit,for every Replacement organi sation

,every officer and

every casual that reaches France .The card O f the Division Replacement shows its

present whereabouts ; port Of arrival ; i ts various

movements in the S O S . its strength in Officers and

men , and the name o f the Commanding Officer. Thesame sort of card is kept for a Machine Shop Truck

Unit or for a Sanitary Squad . In the case of officers

there i s a pink card for each man . It records the com

plete story Of hi s movements from hi s arrival in

France. At the top o f the card i s a scale of numbersfrom I to 12 which indicates branches of the S erv icesuch as In fantry

,Cavalry

,Artillery

,Engineers or

Medical Corps . There i s also a space to indicate


S . O . S .

for all troops in the Zone of the Advance . The sum

of these Returns made out at G .H .Q . makes the

Weekly Strength of the whole American Expedition

ary Force . It i s the basi s for much vi tal statistical

compilation . At present i t i s hardly a source o f aidor comfort to the enemy.

The average man who knows nothing about war

usually has an idea that when troops go overseas they

live in tents or barracks when they are not fighting.

I f thi s were true o f the American ExpeditionaryForce a part o f the army would spend a large portion

O f its time building quarters . Li fe i s too short and

the march o f events too swi ft to permit any suchluxury. Besides , labour and material are much too

valuable . As a result many thousands o f our troops

are billeted during the period o f their training or rest .

The whole process o f billeting,there fore , i s a most

important and highly necessary detail in the workof theThe mention Of bi llets in connection with American

troops discloses a picturesque fact . In the United

States i t i s forbidden by law to billet troops . The

reason dates back to the American Revolution whenBritish troops were quartered on the Colonials and

when thi s “hospitality” roused such resentment thatthe perform ance was never repeated under any cir

cum stances . It i s an interesting commentary on the

Whirligigs of time to find Briti sh homes thrown wideopen to d ay to American troops and what i s more

dramatic, to see the descendants o f thos e Revolution

ary foes fighting side by side for a common cause

MARVELS OF ARM ! ORGAN ISATION 2 75

on the battlefields o f France. The whole billetingprocedure was a new and novel experience for the

doughboy.

At Tours and as a part O f the work o f G4 the whole

Bi lleting Scheme for the A .E .F. i s i n charge O f

Colonel J . W . Wright . Fortunately for us the bi l

leting o f troops is almost as old as the French Army.

Nearly every town or hamlet in France i s bi llet-broke.

For hundreds o f years the cottages have housed

t roops. It has been reduced to such a science that

I am not exaggerating when I say that there i s a

billeting quotation on nearly every rural domesti cestablishment in France .

Soldiers bil leted in the houses o f French citizensare

,to use the expression adopted by the French

Courts,

“en forced guests” of the property owner and

entitled to share the fire and candle with the family.

All householders,with the exception of legal custo

dians O f public funds,widows and spinsters residing

alone, and female rel igious societies, are liable as partof their duty to the State to receive these guests and

to share their fireside wi th them . For thi s the house

holder i s paid one franc ( 20 cents ) per night for eachOfficer provided with a bed

,2 0 centimes ( 4 cents ) for

each non-commissioned Officer and 5 centimes KIcent ) for each soldier. An additional 5 centimes i spaid for each animal supplied with cover. I f the animals are picketed there i s no charge .For the purpose O f billeting we have divided

France into Areas . At Tours a map of France sub

divided into these Areas hangs be fore Colonel

2 76 S . O . S .

Wright’ s desk . Just as soon as a Division i s al lottedto an Area a flag is stuck into i ts Area to Show its

location . The work O f billeting the unit, however ,started long be fore it reached France. As soon as the

organisation sails from the American port G4, whichis advi sed of the sai l ing, gets busy. It must deter

mine whether thi s unit goes into barracks or billets .I f bil lets are decided on the work O f finding an Area

begins at once . A Board of Officers , consisting of a

Major of the Medical Corps,a Captain o f Engineers

and a Captain of the Quartermaster Corps , are sentout to find a suitable Area . These three Officers repre

sent branches o f the Services that represent the most

urgent needs to be met . Thi s Board makes a care ful;

inspection O f all sanitary, water , and transportationfacilities . The main idea is to reduce any new con

struction to a minimum . Available grounds for manoeuvring, drills and target practice are also impor

tant considerations . Thanks to many years of expe

rience the Mayor o f practically every French town

has a Billeting List , which is a l ist o f houses andbarns available for troop lodging. The usual arrange

ment i s to quarter the officers in houses and the men

in barns.When its investigation i s complete the Board makeswhat is known as a B illeting Survey, which is a compact résumé giving the name o f the place ; population ; location ; nature O f terrain ; roads ; rai lway loading and unloading faci l ities ; billeting capacity for

officers and men ; warehouses available for subsistence

and forage ; bathing, stable , grazing, and garage space ;


2 78 S . O . S .

bui lding left with standing wal l s and under an almostincessant shell fire .The best laid billeting plans , l ike those well-laid

plans o f mice and men , o ften go astray. I f an Area

i s selected be fore the crops are harvested,for exam

ple, we sometimes lose as high as forty per cent o f

space be cause the French must use the barns for the

products of their fields . In such a case we are com

pelled to build quarters . Again , when the avalancheo f re fugees came pouring down from the north a fterthe great German off ensive o f last spring our soldiers

voluntari ly surrendered whole sections o f Shelter to

these unhappy human straws caught up in the whirl

wind O f war .When you touch the bil leting of troops you reach

the authority o f one o f the most interesting business

insti tutions in the whole A .E.F. Technically knownas the Renting, Requisition and Claims Service or,as it i s called for short

,

“R .R. i t i s charged

with a combination of routine and responsibi lity thatm akes i t distinct among army organisations . Throughits many-sided operations you discover that the Amer

ican Army abroad i s probably the largest real estate

operator in the world and conducts one of the largest

known Claims agencies. It i s a unique developmentof the war and o f the enormous task o f providing all

the land and buildings of every kind and descriptionneeded by our forces in France. Yet thi s immensetask , involving incessant negotiations with a Government and a people who are sticklers for minute de

tai ls and where the humblest cottage i s the proverbial


every man ’ s castle,has been accompli shed with the

minimum of friction .

In order to appreciate the delicacy of the work of

thi s Service you must keep in mind the fact that

our army is operating in one o f the most densely

populated and highly cultivated countries in the world

where every foot o f land i s util i sed and nothing i s

wasted . No one real ised thi s sooner or better than

General Pershing himse l f who, as early as August,19 17, i ssued a Genera l Order which contained the

following injunction :

The intense cultivation o f the soil in France andthe conditions caused by the war make i t necessarythat extreme care be taken to do no damage to private property. The entire French manhood capableof bearing arms i s in the field fighting the enemy.

Only old men , women and children rem ain to cultivate the soil . It should there fore be a point of honourwith each member O f the American Army to avoiddoing the least damage to any property in France .Such dam age i s much more reprehensible here thanin our own country. Those who may Off end in thi srespect will be brought to trial under the 89th ArticleO f War, and commanding officers wi ll see that promptreparation i s made under the provisions of Article105, even though the damage does not exceed a singlefranc .”

The Service i s in charge o f a General D i rector,Colonel John A . Hull, the Judge Advocate, whilethere i s a Chie f Requi sition Officer, Lieutenant Colo

nel H . T . Klein,and also a Chief Claims Officer,

Lieutenant Colonel Robert Burkham,who are all 10

S . O . S .

cated at Tours — the Headquarters of the Serv ices ofSupply. The work in the field i s divided into various

sections each one with a Section Officer. Our friend

the Zone Major operates in connection with these

officials . With each Division of the American Army

there i s also a representative of the Service known as

the R R. 81 C . Officer.The Renting i s of course a very simple matter of

temporari ly acqui ring property by lease and involves

a bargain mutually satis factory to lessor and lessee .

It i s when you get into the complicated matter of

Requisitions that you strike the first snag. The Amer

ican Army requires thousands of buildings of al l

kinds from barns to immense docks and warehouses .

The French property owner i s no more anx ious to

have his property taken for public use than the aver

age American citizen would be . I f the American has

any political pull he will use i t to the utmost to avoid

having hi s establishment commandeered . So, too, with

the French .

In order to faci l itate thi s work the French Government has granted to the American Government the

right to requisi tion French property in the event thata satis factory lease cannot be obtained . It i s an

extraordinary instance of the confidence that one na

tional administration reposes in another and the veryconsciousness o f thi s power has been a tower o f vi rtue for all American officers . It means that they will

go to the very last l imit o f pati ence and forbearanceto avoid employing thi s weapon . The co— operationbetween the French Government and its citizens i s


S . O . S .

gates and sett les all claims for injury to persons and

property caused by actions and om i ssions of Amer

ican soldiers i ts docket i s pretty full . They include

claims for damages to bi llets,land

,persons

,and claims

ari sing out of theft, depredations , fires , acts o f war or

by A .E.F. vehicles . Congress wisely decided that they

should be paid in accordance with the French military

law and practice.

The Chie f Claims Officer has authority to settle

claims amounting to not over francs, whilethe Section Officer’ s authori ty extends over claims

which do not exceed 500 francs in amount . The Zone

Major’ s authority i s limited to claims of 2 50 francs

or less. Claims involving not more than

francs must have the approval o f the Commanding

General o f the Services of Supply while claims

amounting to over francs are approved bythe Commander-in-Chie f o f the A .E.P.

The great majority of claims are for comparativelysmall i tems which never fai l to amaze the American

soldier. What seems to be a trifling injury , such astearing out o f a manger in a stable , i s a rea l andv ital loss to the frugal French peasant W hose lot this

last four years has not been an easy one . Bes ides ,lumber i s extremely scarce in France and very diffi

cult for the farmer to obtain . Furthermore , theFrench peasant does business on a very small scale

and since the beginning o f the war most of the landcultivation has been done by women

, old men and

young boys.Hence the flood of small claims that almost inun


dates the R R . C. involves i tems that would almost

be regarded as a joke by the American farmer.

Among the claims for small injuries are for broken

window-panes,injury to paint

,broken plaster

,and

door-knobs . Not an infrequent cause o f complaint i s

the loss of a key. The removal of thi s highly-useful

but not enti rely indi spensable articl e i s never over

looked . The French peasant,however, regards a key

as important and valuable as a title deed to his property ; a state of mind , I might add , that i s entirely

shared by the owners o f French hotels . I have knownof a hotter row being kicked up over the loss of a

key in a big French hotel than over the theft of a

thousand dolla rs in Ameri ca .

Injury to French land involves two separate and

distinct causes . One i s damage resulting from the

immediate necessities of war— the so— called “

faits de

gam e’fi— for which no compensation i s paid

,and in

jury which comes about in the natural course o f care

less event . Of course human nature,no less active

with the French than any other national ity similarly

placed , i s very apt to ascribe all losses to the secondcause and therein l ie s the most frequent subj ect o f

controversy. Indeed it i s extremely difficult sometimes to convince the Frenchman that whatever has

happened to hi s goods or hi s chattel s was the faulto f the god o f War instead o f the god of Man .

A unit was once encamped on a farm near the front.Its mules were picketed nearby. Suddenly and with

out warn ing a numbe r of German shell s dropped on

the camp . The animals were turned loose and they

S . O . S .

beat a retreat that was more strategi c than orderly.

Being by nature destructive beasts , they took the

shortest cut to the rear , which happened to be throughhighly cultivated gardens and orchards where they

played havoc . With great difficulty the farmer was

convinced that the un fortunate action was an act o f

War and there fore he could receive no compensation .

The real humours o f war are found in these French

claims for comparatively smal l damages . A well

meaning cow died from eating camouflaged grass

meant to deceive the Hun but not the unsuspecting

herds of France . Her owner fi led a claim which

proved that the beast was an innocent bystander o f

War and which was paid . Another cow attracted

by the remnants of grass on a bombing range allowed

either her curiosity or her hunger to get the better o f

her animal discretion and died a s a result of eating

the grass , which had been poisoned by the contents o f

the grenades used on the range. She was also put into

the innocent bystander class .All damage by American student aviators who are

now flying all over France and who have sometimes

to descend unceremoniously in a field under cultiva

tion , are paid by the as are claims for theconsiderable injuries resulting in the Training Areasfrom trench-digging

,bomb-throwing, rifle-practice

and also practice with machine-guns and heavy arti l

le ry. The French have come to the conclusion that

our horses and mules are highly discriminating when

they go out to pasture , because they always select the

best gardens and orchards. This straying into fertile


2 86 S . O . S .

doctrine O f contributory negligence which frequentlyi s a complete de fence in America does not obtain in

France . Hence we have many street accident claims

to pay.

The French have a high sense of appreciation of

our j ustice and generosity in thi s matter o f damage

claims. Let it be said to thei r credit that they some

times do not present a bil l o f injury . Not long ago

the following letter was received by the CommandingGeneral of the Services of Supply from a father

whose daughter had been injured by one of our big

motor trucks

In the name o f my daughter , victim of an accidentcaused by an auto truck in the service o f your army ;in the name o f her late husband who died for Francewith decorations by order o f the army ; of hi s daughter and my whole family ; considering the correct attitude and considering the pain ful position of themilitary auto-driver

,under the strict lash of military

di scipline,I have the honour to plead in hi s favour

for your kind indulgence .“After the pain and suff ering resulting from theaccident which I hope i s only temporary it will bepro foundly pain ful to us to think that a brave soldierwho came to de fend us , m ay be punished severelyfor an act for which he is not to e blam e .

“Trusting in your kindness, commander, will youreceive kindly the assurance o f our high regard .

All thi s difficult work requi res a highly speciali sedtrain ing, partly legal but mostly human . In order to

secure the necessary personnel a school has been estab

lished at Tours to equip men for the R R. C . Serv


ice . It i s held in a whitewashed room in the old

French Barracks. More than one student bears on

his right sleeve the chevron that proclaims woundedin action .

” Typical o f the contrasts that war creates

thi s institution i s in charge of a former lecturer atthe Harvard Law School . Stranger sti ll i s the situa

tion which dai ly finds American Officers , lawyers by

profession,sitting as quasi courts in equity through

out France and administering French laws to French

people so that justice shall prevai l . In thi s war— as

in no other— everything i s po ssible and nothing i ssurprising.

When posterity makes its appraisal o f the Americaneff ort in France no detai l wi ll probably come in for

a larger degree o f wonder and admiration than the

immense amount o f construction reared by these alien

hands in a foreign land . The A .E.F. has been a

Master Builder. The whole task O f army construe

tion comprises a branch o f the American Business of

War that expresses American energy and enterprise

to a degree not surpassed in any other Serv ice o f

Supply. Uncle Sam is a Boss Contractor and on astupendous scale . He runs a bui lding business precisely l ike any o f the great constructi on corporations

in New York or Chicago. The only difference i s that

while a private concern must solici t trade,the A .E.F

gets all i t wants without the asking.

At the head o f this work is Brigadier General Edgar

Jadwin , Director o f Construction and Forestry, whoseoffice in that now-famous quadrangle at Tours i s thenerve-centre of the army building that ranges from

2 88 S . O . S .

the construction of an immense dock at a Base portup to the erection of a temporary storage shed in theZone of the Armies. Under him i s an army of more

than men , including thousands O f foresters .

He could build a fair— S ized city almost overnight ; no

specialised task from a bakery to a cold storage plant

i s outside the capabilities o f this host which toi ls

with hammer and saw with the same fidelity as the

man who fights with guns. In a previous a rt icle I

told the story o f some o f the achievements registeredby the army engineers. It only remains to Show the

business side o f the organisation which i s a striking

lesson in centralisation .

Despite the myriad construction enterprises con

stantly underway throughout France there i s a“ fol

low-up” system which keeps track o f every undertak

ing. In what is known as a File o f Projects , GeneralJadwin maintains an up

-to-date record o f all work

under way . Each piece of work is on a separate sheetand whether it i s a dock , warehouse or hospital he can

tel l at once how far i t has advanced and what remainsto be done. This results f rom the fact that hi s Serv ice

i s charted from Director down to a gang cutting tim

ber in a far-away forest . He has a Chie f Engineer

in every one of the Sections in France . Each Chie fhas his own organ i sation, which i s a link in the armyConstruction chain . I f a dock i s to be built in Base

Section Numbe r One the plans and specifications aresent to the Chie f Engineer o f that Section who ischarged with execution . It i s up to him to see i t

through . He makes dai ly and weekly reports of



progress,which enable the Director to keep his File

o f Proj ects l ive . When I was in Base Section Num

ber Two exactly one thousand projects o f one kind

or another were under way.

This Proj ect Fi le,however, i s only one detai l in

the plan o f organisation . The whole scheme o f army

construction i s visual ised on the huge Map o f Con

struction which hangs in General Jadwin ’ s office and

which shows every piece o f work under way. Eachkind o f job i s indicated by a colour. A hospital i s

indicated by a tan square ; a railway yard by a whiteone ; a Supply Depot in straw ; a Camp Site in blue ;an Aviation Camp in red

,and so on.

In the same way each type o f work has its ownchart. What is known as the Hospitali sation Chart i sone o f the marvels o f system . It shows in waves and

in thousands O f beds ( all hospital s are built i n termso f bed-capacity ) how the enorm ous system of Amer

ican Hospitali sati on in France i s expanding by leapsand bounds . A line in blue

,for example

,Shows the

bed space available in Base hospitals and hotels ; green

indicates the be d space in camp hospitals,while mauve

locates hospital bui ldings under way. The A .E .F. follows the rule o f having ten hospital beds for every

hundred men oversea . Our hospital construction, or

Hospitali sation as it i s known,i s so standardi sed that

we build in regular units of a thousand beds and have

been known to erect three or four o f these in a singleday.

All construction plans and specifications with theexception of those for Railway Transportation are

S . O . S .

prepared by a large force o f draughtsmen which ispart o f the staff

\of the Director o f Construction and

Forestry . The plans for rai lway proj ects are drawn

under the di rection of the Director General of Trans

portation,for whom General Jadwin acts as Consult

ing Engineer.This mighty construction not only requi res an army

o f toi lers but an immense amount o f lumber. This

brings us to the se cond phase o f General Jadwin’ s

work . Obviously i t i s impossible to transport themillions and millions o f feet of timber from the

United States . Tonnage , as you have learned , i s the

supreme problem o f the A .E.P. and must be uti lisedfor material that cannot be obtained abroad . The

army there fore decided to produce its own timber by

cutting i t in France . This has led to the organisation

and development o f a complete Forestry Service which

i s mobil ised wi th the same scientific care as any other

branch of the army.

In the Forestry regiments you can find lumber

j acks who have made the chips fly in the forestso f Wi sconsin

,Maine

,Washington , Michigan , Ore

gon , Louisiana and Alabama . They are a hardy, sea

soned,weather-beaten

,competent lot and have ren

dered a service comparable to that of the locomotiveengineers and firemen who le ft cabs and tenders on

the American systems to drive the army i ron horsesin France.By arrangement with the French Government we

have acquired nearly two hundred French forests

where you can hear the z ip o f American saws and the


292 S . O . S .

month and the number of our saw-mills i s rapidly

nearing the one hundred mark .

Construction i s only one consumer o f army wood inFrance . The army must be kept warm

,which means

that for the twelve months between July Ist, 19 18,

and June 3oth , 19 19 , the Quartermaster Corps

which provides fuel for the A .E .F .

— will require

tons o f cord wood . One cord equals two

tons . The wood for fuel i s cut under the direction

o f the Chie f Quartermaster and at the time I write

is being done in the Advance Section by more thanten thousand men who include nearly two thousand

civilian labourers ; the others are American soldiers .A study o f the American Business o f War would

be incomplete without a look at that highly necessary

detai l in the conduct o f a corporation,which is the

pay roll . In addition to many war-born distinctions

Uncle Sam has become one o f the largest employers

in the world with a box-oflice second to none . Al

though the doughboy has no worries about the High

Cost o f Living so far as France i s concerned ( he i s

fed like a fighting cock ) he likes to have money inhi s pocket and his grate ful Government sees that he

gets it promptly no matter i f he is fighting at the

front or serving in the rear.The principal army disbursing in France i s done

under the auspices o f the Chie f Quartermaster , whopays all tr00ps except those in the Engineer , Signal ,Medical

,Ordnance and Air Services . He also pro

vides the money for billets , for subsistence , clothingand gaso lene bought in Europe and for the rental o f

MARVELS OF ARM ! ORGAN ISATION 293

the French telegraph wires that we lease. The Chief

Disbursing Officer,Lieutenan t-Colonel C . B . Eckels ,

handles more money than most big banks. Although

he deals in millions he never sees any o f the actual

cash . In September alone the amount o f money that

passed through his ofl‘ice represented more than $100,

O f course thi s money i s not sent from theUnited States . A very simple system o f exchange of

national credits makes i t possible for us to always have

available funds .

Every American soldier i s paid in the money o f thecountry in which he i s serving and in cash . I f a

doughboy in France i s unmarried,carries no war ri sk

insurance and has not subscribed on the instalment

plan for a Liberty Bond,he gets $33 a month , or,

based on the rate o f exchange at the time I write , 188

francs and 10 centimes . Wherever a soldier has allot

ments , whether for family, Liberty Loan or insurance ,thi s amount is first deducted from his pay and he gets

the proceeds . The men are paid once a month byso— called Disbursing Quartermasters . I f a man i s i ll

or wounded in a hospital the money is brought to him .

With pay as with everything else the American sol

dier gets the benefit o f the last word in army convenience . This means that recently we have introduced a new and compact Individual Pay Record

Book which i s a substitute for the old-time and cumbersom e army pay roll which the men had to sign .

I f he were wounded or lost he frequently missed hispay for several months be cause there was no accessi

ble record of what he had hitherto received . The new

S . O . S .

pay book,which must be carried by the soldier on hi s

person al l the time,eliminates this hardship . In it i s

recorded every paym ent made to him and it i s l ikewise

a complete history o f the owner together with hi sfamily financial obligations i f he has any.

This book i s patterned a fter a similar one carri edby the Briti sh Tommy. It lacks one detai l of themodel , however, in that i t has no blank space on whichthe soldier may make hi s will . Thousands o f Briti sh

troops have written their last testament within sound

o f the guns and just be fore going over the top in that

little blank space which i s so o ften thei r farewell

indited message on earth .

The American army pay book i s a great deal more

than an up-to—date ledger o f the soldier’ s income . The

record of the automatic withdrawal o f the allotments

for wi fe or mother i s a constant reminder of obliga

tion to family,while the equally systematic payment

o f his instalment on the Liberty Loan i s a kindred

stimulus to financial responsibi lity to hi s country and

his flag. It begets a sense o f thri ft and saving that,l ike so many other war experiences, becomes a con

structive precedent for peace.The army pay book i s just one of many first aids

to the soldier’ s physical and economic convenience .

Just a s a Store on Wheels goes to the man in thetrenches so does a Travelling Adjuster visit units in

the field in the interests of War Risk Insurance. The

psychology of thi s i s interesting. The nearer a man

gets to the Zone of Death the more apt he i s to want

to protect hi s family in case he i s killed . A bursting


X II— S ystem Unto D eath

HE extraordinary system that accounts for allthings in the army from a can o f food to afive-ton truck renders a kindred and ultimate

service with each li ttle sepulchre o f glory that dots

the fields o f France. Here i s an act that reachesacross the sea and touches the hearts and homes of allAmerica . Since no soldier’ s body can be transported

to'

the United States unti l a fter the peace treaty is

signed , the care o f the overseas graves becomes a matter of supreme responsibili ty. Through a supervision

that combines tender solicitude with minute detai lnearly every square yard of French earth “with a

richer earth concealed” i s marked and can be identified when the Pilgrimage o f Remembrance begins .Our grave registration is perhaps the most difficult

in the war for the reason that while the British,for

example , operate in a compact area in France ourmen are in the l ine from the English Channel to the

Vosges. They have been thrown in the battle-frontat unexpected times and places and everywhere theyhave christened the ground with their good red blood .

The complicated and sometimes hazardous labour of

finding and marking these graves i s entrusted to what

is known as the Graves Registration Serv ice , whichhas fulfil led a sacred obligation with a fidelity that

296

SYSTEM UNTO DEATH 297

will give thi s all-necessary detai l o f war a whole newdi stinction in the days to come .The direction of such a task dem ands not only real

organising genius but sympathy and understanding as

well . All these qual ities are happi ly embodied in Lieutenant Colonel Charles C . Pierce, who is the Chief of

the Service . This big-souled , kindly man has cheered

the ach ing hearts o f bereaved American wives,moth

ers and sweethearts ever since the first Phi lippines cam

paign took tol l o f our troops . He went to Manila as

an army chaplain . He soon found out that saving

families from the agony of suspense about the loca

tion o f the graves o f the loved-ones was as important

as saving souls , SO he devised a scientific system o f

accurate identification and regi stration . When we

were ready to establish a similar service in France hewas the logical choice to organi se it .

Although its function is as sentimental as i t i s gruesome the Graves Registration Service i s organised

precise ly l ike any other branch of the American Army.

Colonel Pierce , who i s part of the QuartermasterCorp s, i s at the apex o f the pyramid which outlines

every detai l O f its work from the acquisition O f cemeteries to the photographic record o f a lonely gravesomewhere on the fringe o f battle . The G .R .S .

as the Graves Registration Service i s called for short— has nothing to do with the burial of the dead ( thisis done by Burial Squads with the army ) , but it takesup the work the moment that the grave is fil led . Itregisters and inspects graves ; corresponds with relatives and friends of deceased soldiers, conducts a l ia i

S . O. S .

son with our Alli es in all matters of mortuary interest,

and , what i s most important O f all , maintains such

a complete and accurate record of every soldier ’ s grave

in France that when the war i s over i t can be easi ly

located .

To do this, Graves Registration must have the co

operation of the armies in the field . It begins with the

individual soldier. Every officer, private and civi lian

attached to the A .E .F. must wear two aluminum iden

ti ty tags. They are about the size o f a si lver hal f

dollar and of a suitable thickness and must be worn

suspended from the neck underneath the clothing by

a cord or thong passed through a hole in the tag. The

second tag i s suspended from the first one by a short

piece of string or tape . In the case o f officers these

discs are stamped with the name, rank , regiment , corps

or department o f the wearer and the letters “US .

”

I f a man is an,

aviator hi s tag wou ld hear the words“U . S . Air Serv ice.” Many officers wear a metal ,

identification plate attached to a chain around the

wrist . W ith private soldiers the tags are simply

stamped with the soldier ’ s name and the letters“U. S . A.

”on one side and the army serial number on

the other. In the British army the religious faith of

the soldier is indicated . C.E . stands for Church o f

England and RC . for Roman Cathol ic .

When a soldier i s ki lled in action the burial squad

i s required to bury one of the identification discs with

the body and place the other in a bottle or attach it.

in some way to the temporary marker over hi s grave.


300 S . O . S .

Registration o f graves involves no small degree ofdanger. In the Zone of the Armies the G .R .S . Unitsfollow closely on the heels o f the burial part ies o f

the combat troops,registering and veri fying the tem

porary markings o f all graves,searching for and

burying bodies that have been overlooked,and regu

lating and organising the battleground cemetery whichri ses so O ften and so sadly almost overnight on the

hillsides and in the valleys . Some o f these Registrars develop an uncanny instinct for locating un

marked graves. I have known them to stop suddenlyon the road and a fter a swi ft glance at a field nearby

that gave absolutely no sign o f a grave say,

“A soldieris buried out there . A sk how they know it and they

will tel l you that it i s determ ined by a variety of reasons which may be a slight depression in the groundor the appearance and formation o f the soi l .A fter every battle an off enswe i s launched for the

d ead precisely like the one launched for the l iving.

It i s composed o f the Advance Groups of the GravesRegistration Service . Each one consists of an officer

and ten men . They deploy a skirmish line to find out

i f any grave or bodies have been overlooked . Theywork under shell fire and per form a service that i sboth heroic and holy. I can pay no higher tribute towhat they do than to reproduce part o f a Letter ofCommendation about one o f them— it was in charge

o f Second Lieutenant Homer B . M cCorm ick— whichwas issued by special direction o f General Pershing.

The official account of the particular pe r formance is

as follows

S ! STEM UNTO DEATH 1

. 301

On Apri l 20,Lieut . M cCorm ick and hi s Group

arrived at Mandres and began thei r work under heavyshel l fire and gas

,and although troops were in dug

outs,these men immediately went to the cemetery

,and

in order to preserve records and locations,repaired

and erected new crosses as fast as the O ld ones wereblown down . They also completed the extension tothe cemetery

,this work occupying one and a hal f

hours, during which time shells were falling continually and they were subj ected to mustard gas . Theygathered many bodies which had been first in thehands o f the Germans

,and were later retaken by

American counter attacks . Identification was especially difficult , al l papers and tags having been re

moved . and most of the bodies being in a terriblecondition and beyond recognition . The Lieutenantin command particularly mentions Sergeant Keatingand Privates La Rue and Murphy

,as having been

responsible for the most gruesome part o f the worko f identification , examining every body most thoroughly, searching for scars or tattoo marks and wherebodies were blown to pieces

,these men were especially

particular to make minute examination,regardless of

the danger attendant upon their work . Thi s groupof men was in charge of everything at Mandres fromthe time the bodies were brought in unti l they wereinterred and marked with crosses and proper nameplates were attached .

”

As soon as a man i s killed in action hi s death i s

reported by telegraph or runner by hi s immediate

Commanding Officer to the Adjutant o f the uni t,who

in turn sends it to the Adjutant General o f the

who supervises the preparation o f the Casualty List

the Roll of Honour. No casualty i s reported,how

S . O . S .

ever, unti l the official grave location i s received . Thisis due to the fact that men missing and reported deadfor days or weeks sometimes show up in time or have

been captured by the enemy. The Service, therefore ,takes every precaution to prevent a premature noticeo f death being sent out.

The system o f grave location becomes a highly important part of Casualty Intelligence. When a graveIS properly marked a so-called Grave Location Blank-made out in duplicate — i s sent to the Graves Regis

f ration office . It shows the name , rank and number

O f the soldier ; the place o f burial ; the grave number ;whether the grave is marked with a peg

,headboard ,

cross or bottle ; the disposition of the identification tagand any other remarks . Thi s Blank must be signed

by the chaplain who officiated at the burial or someother officer present . One copy o f this Blank goesto Graves Registration and the other to Central Rec

ords for its Master Card Index of the A .E.F. The

permanent record o f the grave i s put on a card whichcontains the army history of the soldier ; where hedied ; the nature o f hi s wound ; how he was identified ;the numbe r of the Casualty Cablegram in which hisdeath was officially reported ; hi s next of kin , and thedi sposition of his pe rsonal eff ects . A special Eff ects

Depot, in Base Section Number One, assembles theproperty O f all men killed and transmits i t to theirfamilies.Not content with making certain that every grave

is properly located and registered , the G.R .S . performs

sti ll another kindly serv ice m the shape of a letter


304 S . O . S .

for marking the graves of the Hebrew dead . In no

ins tance i s a cross used . I f only crosses are availablethe horizontal piece i s removed and the name plateor number i s attached to the perpendicular section or

standard . The prescribed marking for Jewish soldiers

i s a square headboard which is carried on the regularl ist of Quartermaster supplies . When you know this

you feel certain that i f any Mahometan should die in

the service o f the A .E.P. he would be laid away with

hi s head towards hi s beloved East !The army system which knows neither f riend nor

foe carries its tender ministrations to the enemy dead .

Whenever i t i s necessary for the A .E .F. to bury a

German or an Austrian a section of a mili tary cemetery i s uti li sed . A report o f this grave location is

made just as in the case o f an American . The indications o f rank and service are reproduced in Germanas well as English . The location of these graves is

conveyed to the German authorities through the American Legation at Berne

,acting with the Red Cross .

One more picturesque detai l wil l i llustrate the thor

oughness o f Graves Regi stration . Whenever a grave

i s “i solated,

” which means that it may be outside acemetery

,in some obscure French burial-ground or in

a detached field,a sketch i s made of it and becomes a

part of the location records. I have seen scores ofthese sketches. They are so minute and accurate that

a child could find the grave by having the diagram inits hand . I f the grave is near a road the sketch willnot only Show the road and adjacent territory but will

speci fy that “a group of firs is six feet away .

” On

SYSTEM UNTO DEATH 305

another sketch I saw this direction : The grave is

fi fteen feet from the road and under a shel l hole ina stone wall .” Arrangements have recently been com

pleted for a photographic record o f every Americangrave in France . It will be done under the auspiceso f the Red Cross. Such elaborate supervision means

that the percentage o f “unknown” American dead in

thi s war will be smaller than ever before in history.

The efficiency o f the A .E .P. obtains even unto

death : Greater love than thi s hath no army.

X III— Business M anaging W ar

HEN the real story of the Great War i s wri tten and some dispassionate appraisal i s made

of the causes o f victory it will be found thatthe laurel o f civi li sation’ s triumph will rest with no

single nation . It was not the unspeakable sacrificeo f Belgium, the incomparable heroism o f France , the

dauntless courage o f the British,the blithe daring of

America, the fortitude o f Italy, or the well-nigh for

gotten Russian resistance o f the early days . Ratherwas it the co-ordination o f all this superb effort ex

pressed in the Unity o f High Command at the front ,coupled with no less flexible and compact Unity o f

Supply in the rear, that made the achievem ent possible.

To thi s unification,which must stand out as the

really determining factor in the war ( Germany didnot begin to crumple up until the Foch Consolidated

Hammer began to strike ) America has contributedher full share . Nor i s thi s surprrsmg. Co-ordinationi s s imply another name for that larger standardisa

tion of efficiency and product which epitomise her industrial genius . It became one of her overseas aimsthe mom ent she became a full-fledged partner in the

Business of War and had an army in the field . With

thi s Business M anaging of War, as i t may well be

306


S . O . S .

becomes quite evident that without the purchasingagency we have set up

,the whole American war par

ticipation might have been seriously impaired .

Through its Labour Bureau it secured , maintained andmilitarised an army o f civi lians in Europe

,

Asia and Africa , which was another tonnage saver.It has been the si lent submarine-fighter. The story

O f the world-wide machine that it has created , thefortitude and resource o f the business men in khaki

who Operate it,and the constructive and co o perative

influence that it has exerted upon the conduct of the

war, compri se a fitting finale to the panorama of theServices o f Supply o f which i t is a part , and which

has passed in review be fore you .

Army purchase began in France the moment that

the first American Expeditionary Force landed . Ob

viously i t could not carry al l the supplies i t neededand hungry men and beasts cannot wait . In addition ,our first Engineering units arrived practically without tools . I t meant intensive purchasing, which has

kept up on an increasing scale ever since .As the overseas force expanded thi s buying which

began by scattered units was. done by organised Serv

ices . Each Service has its Purchasing Officer. The in

evitable happened . So urgent was the demand for supplie s of all kinds that these branches of the army weresoon in commendable but costly competition with eachother. When the Quartermaster Corps priced a quantity of material

,for example

,and returned in a f ew

days with the necessary authority to buy,i t discov

ered that the Engineers had already absorbed it. The

BUSINESS MANAGING WAR 309

evi l went further because the French business man ,being human, stimulated this competition and raised

his price accordingly. The French army,in turn

,felt

the effect o f this competition and a serious si tuation

developed .

No one realised thi s more swi ftly than General

Pershing, whose grasp of business detai l and instinctfor standardisation are almost uncanny . He saw that

while every ton we bought in Europe aided the whole

shipping programme , the purchase o f that ton mustbe orderly and constructive . In August

,19 17, he

authorised a General Purchasing Board composed of

the Purchasing Officers of the various Services andwith a General Purchasing Agent at the head . This

Agent was to be the representative o f the Commanderin-Chie f in liaison with the various Allied purchasing

agencies and charged also with the co-ordination and

supervi sion of all purchasing agents in the A .E.F.

The problem was to find a business man in the army

with sufficient financial and commercial experi ence to

attach himsel f to a desk and organise thi s all-important work . It required v ision , executive ability , and

the power to handle difficult situations arising out of

negotiations with foreign governments. Fortunatelya man of this calibre happened to be wearing the uni

form of an officer o f Engineers in France . He was

the then Lieutenant Colonel,and now Brigadier Gen

eral , Charles G . Dawes , who had be en Comptroller o f

Currency under President M cKinley and who had

worked his way from humble station in an Ohio townto be president of one o f the leading Trust Companies

S . O. S .

in Chi cago. He expressed the highest poss ible capitalisation of business brains for the Business of War.When we went to war with Germany he sought activeservice . Having be en Chie f Engineer of a small rai l

way in the Middle West in his early days , he obtaineda commission in a famous Engineer regiment which

was one of the first to arrive in France and which

has le ft its impress in docks,rai lway construction and

Supply Depots .General Pershing knew General Dawes when the

latter was a practising lawyer in Lincoln, Nebraska .He had followed his admirable career in the army so

he installed him in Pari s as General Purchasing Agent.He began in a small room in the Hotel Sainte Anne

which was then the Headquarters o f the AmericanArmy. TO-day his staff and the associated organisa

tions not only occupy the largest hotel in Paris buthave representatives in nearly a dozen different countries . Thus with Purchasing— as with every other

detai l of American Supply— you get the now familiarmiracle of an almost unprecedented expansion .

When you examine the work o f the General Purchasing Agent and the General Purchasing Boardthey are two separate and distinct propositions-” youfind that they paral lel for war the same system o f

organ i sation observed by a huge corporation in peace .

Let me illustrate with the case o f the United S tatesSteel Corporation . I f every one of its subsidiary com

panies purchased raw material , machinery and generalsupplies on i ts own and in the op en market the over

head co st would be excessive on account o f the lively



competition . Instead,the corporation established a

Chie f Purchasing Agent who buys for the whole insti

tution . All requirements are submitted to him ahead

of time ; he anticipates needs , and gets the best possible product and price . It i s centralised buying. This

i s precisely what happened with the A .E.F. The— as the General Purchasing Agent i s

called— and the G.P.B which i s the General Pur

chasing Board,do all the overseas buying for our

armies through a system that i s a marvel Of co ordina

tion and result .The General Purchasing Agent occupies a pecul iar

yet distinct position . Although every dollar’ s worth

o f material that we buy outside o f America i s pur

chased under hi s authority he does no buying himsel f .The buying i s done through the heads of the Purchas

ing Departments o f the various Services who constitute the General Purchasing Board and who maintain

,

as a result, an independence of purchase . They pur

chase by category , that is by specific lists o f i tems , andthe process i s there fore known as Categori cal Pur

chasing. The General Purchasing Agent,however

,

acts as a general co— ordinator o f all thi s buying. Heapproves although he cannot initiate purchase. He

likewise exercises the ful l power o f veto which is thecheck on excess , extravagance and confl ict with theinterests of our Allies .Whether in France

,Switzerland

,Spain

,Italy

,Hol

land, Sweden , O-r Portugal the General Purchasing

Agent, through hi s representative in that country, becomes the outpost and the scout for supplies. He

locates horses, digs up raw material , discovers machinery

,secures options on crops . The actual buying

o f all thi s,however, i s done by the representative o f

the Service for which it i s intended acting under the

G .P .A . representative’ s supervision . Thi s procedure

i s expedited— you must step l ively in war buying

for the reason that an officer O f each Service is attached to every foreign branch o f the G .P .A . In such

a transaction,therefore, the agent of the G .P.A . acts

as Co-ordinating Officer. The great bulk of our over

seas buying, however, i s in France where an explanation of the system reveal s the whole working of an

organisation which i s second to no Allied Business

institution geared up to the needs of the war.In order to get a comprehensive view we must begin

in the Office of General Dawes in the Elysee PalaceHotel which is the Headquarters o f all A .E.F. pur

chasing activities . Every American who has visited

Pari s in recent years wi ll at once appreciate the pic

ture sque significance that attaches to the use of thi s

hotel for war purposes . The imposing stone strue

ture , which occupies a full block on the ChampsElyse

’

es,was the favourite stamping ground— so far

as Paris was concerned— o f the beauty, chivalry and

royalty of Europe be fore the war. Here King Leopold of Belgium maintained a suite. In the foyer

dukes,diplomats and stage favouri tes mingled in gay

and festive arrayVanished are al l these social splendours. Where

once the champagne glasses clinked you hear the rat

tle of American typewriters ; in the gilded dining room


3 14 S . O . S .

of General Pershing. At the apex i s the Commanderin-Chie f. Linked with him is the Commanding Gen

eral of the Servi ces o f Supply. Tied up with both o f

these is the from whom radiates such a network of co-ordinated agencies that the chart lookslike the reproduction of an octopus whose tentacles

extend everywhere . They bind the A .E .F. up with

al l our Allies ; they extend to every foreign country

where we buy supplies ; they disclose a succession o f

compact, scientific and highly-organised bureaus that

do everything from standardising accounts to settingup insurance against a fter-the-war investigations . To

analyse them in order i s to dissect a system that couldaudit

,manage

,and safeguard the fiscal interests of any

huge American corporation no matter how large .The Control Bureau will aptly i llustrate how the

organisation works . At the head i s Lieutenant-Colonel Franc1s E . Drake whose long contact with Big

Business in Europe equipped him to deal with the

many problems that Continental war-t ime buying develop . Associated with him 18 a group o f American

business men,most of them long residents o f Paris

who le ft lucrative posts to give army buying the benefitof their varied experience .The Control Bureau i s the clearing house for al l

American army orders . They flow in to the extent of

several hundred each day from the Purchasing De

partments of the eleven Services that buy everythingfrom rai ls to trucks . Not only must every order havethe approval of the General Purchasing Agent but all

orders involving amounts in excess of must

BUSINESS MANAGING WAR 3 15

have the additional approval of the French Government . Hence the bureau maintains an intimate andconstant liaison with the French Government whichis one o f the most interesting and constructive phaseso f i ts work .

Every Service in the A .B.E. gets — and i t will continue unti l the army leaves France — what i s knownas the Forward Requirements o f i ts various units .By Forward Requi rements i s meant future needs.

These Requirements are transmitted to the General

Purchasing Agent who consolidates them . He likewise co-ordinates all dem ands for certain standard

commodities . I f , for example, the Quartermaster

Corps , Ordnance and Engineers all need shovel s the

whole army need of shovels i s unified in one requisi

t ion and the buying i s done by the Engineers . Thissaves labour and enables the army to buy in larger

quantities and get the benefit of such purchasing.

Orders for food,timber or leather require slight

supervision . I f they involve the use o f metal— as the

great majority o f them do— they are caught up atonce in a drasti c scrutiny which not only shows

Franco—American supply co-ordination at its be st butun folds a process o f close knit business administra

tion that will have i ts eff ect long a fter the last shotof the war i s fired . This brings us to the Metal Con

trol Office whose task i s to scrutinise the amount o f

metal required for the manu facture o f articles for

American army use . Installed as Metal Controller i s

Captain Charles E . Carpe nter, who had been a brill iantand success ful machinery expert in Pari s i n civi l li fe .

S . O . S .

He allots al l metal for A .E .F. use . I f the needs ofthe diff erent Purchasing Departments exceed the avail

able supply he distributes the material in proport ionto the need .

The moment you touch metal you touch one of themost zealously conserved commodities in France . The

reason i s quite obvious. In the first flush o f her war

successes and when she came down from the Northlike a “wol f on the fold” Germany acquired by con

quest more than eighty per cent o f the i ron and steelproducing capacity o f France. A metal crisi s at once

developed . The French war industries became de

pendent to a large extent for thei r raw supplies uponother countries . Much o f thi s material had to come

from the United States and there fore became a partof the eternal tonnage problem . Be fore we enteredthe war it was not so serious . Just as soon as webegan to manu facture munitions for our own use the

French metal situation naturally became more acute .

Every ton of i ron or steel diverted to a non-essential

use not only meant the loss O f thi s material to warnecessities but likewise wasted a ton o f valuable shipping. Hence the French Government wisely established a rigid control over the supply o f al l raw materials and mainly metals .The advent o f the American Army in numbers made

the metal situation more serious because we began toplace orders in France for machinery

,too ls and other

articles that used steel and i ron and which could notbe shipped from the United States because we needed

the tonnage for men and food . This constantly in


S . O . S .

constantly at the Inspection des Forges. Just as soon

as an Ameri can Army order arrives i t i s analysed .

Many essential requirem ents must be met. Since i t

involves a contract with a French manu facturer the

first step i s to find out i f thi s particular firm or indi

v idual i s on the Black List, that is, i f it i s excluded

from dealings wi th the French Government. Then

comes the examination of the amount o f metal re

quired and the relation that i t bears to the distribution

o f the limited supply o f raw material s in France . The

third i tem is the all-important question o f price,since

i t i s neither the desire nor the interests of the French

Government that the American army be charged more

than the French consumers. The final qualification

is the ability o f the contractor to fulfil his Obligation

within the time limit prescribed . All thi s in formation

i s readily accessible to the Insp ection des Forges be

cause its hundreds o f inspectors are constantly in

touch with the manu facturing establi shments in their

di stri cts and know to the quarter of a ton what the

plant capacities are.

I f the order and the contractor meet requirements

the approval o f the Inspection des Forges i s stamped

on i t and it returns to the American Control Bureau

for the General Purchasing Agent ’ s approval . Once

stamped with his v isé the contract makes one more

journey to another Department of the Frenéh Gov

e rnm ent to be examined with regard to the possibility

of its interference with similar work being done for

the French armi es. I f no* confl ict is establ ished it


receives the final O K. and goes to the contractor for

execution .

This scrutiny shows that there i s l ittle chance for

the p rofiteer to get in his ne farious work . Wherever

evidence of attempted extortion i s found the French

Government takes the matter in i ts own hands and

requi sitions the material or merchandise on the ac

count O f the army. This close team-work resulting

from a double examination of orders by both govern

ments prevents competition between the two armies .

When there i s a limi ted supply of certain art icles it

insures equitable distribution between them .

The probe that the Inspection des Forges applies to

all American contracts has “smoked out” many a profiteer to the eminent sati s faction o f the French author

ities . Just as soon as a French contractor arouses the

suspicion of thi s admi rable agency of conservation Hei s summoned to Headquarters and i s put through the“thi rd degree by the French that disgorges every

thing . Particular attention i s given to middle men or

men who handle army contracts as a side line. The

American army contract has been the mean s o f ren

dering conspicuous service in uncovering overcharges,as leading O fficials o f the Inspection des Forges glee

fully in formed me . Upon one occasion a Parisianentered into a contract with the A .E.F. to provide a

certain number of hacksaws . The contract wentthrough the routine mi ll and reached what well mightbe called the prosecuting attorney o f the Inspection des

Forges, who, smelling a mouse, summoned the con

tractor to his presence. It developed that he has a

S . O . S .

dealer in pearls who was handling hacksaws as a sidel ine. The price he had made f or them gave theFrench the impression that he sti l l believed he was

dealing in precious stones . Not only was he deprived

o f the contract but the French Government put himon a list where he could do no further extorting.

The generous co— operation o f the French Govern

ment with our army has no higher expression than ,in the work of the Inspection des Forges , which has

saved the 'United States infinite anxiety, time andmoney. This institution

,however

,i s not only the

watchdog of war— time product and pocket-book buti t will be a bulwark o f French industry after the war

and a v ital instrumen t with which to combat German

industrial aggression . I t can be developed into a

tremendous rival of the celebrated German M e tal!

Gesellschaf t which , with the Allgemeéne Electrische

Gesellschaf t~ the Teutonic Electri c Machinery Trust—was on the point o f dictating terms to the Conti

nental metal industry when the war interfered with its

mighty programme .Closely allied with thi s Metal Control i s a kindred

control o f equal importance . With more thanthreefourths of her iron and steel resources in the hands ofthe Germans

,France faced a serious problem in fill

ing orders for the American army. She was perfectly

wi lling to help us out and relieve the strain on shipping but she had to have the wherewithal to produce

the goods . To this end an arrangem ent was enteredinto by which we transport raw material from the

United States and parcel i t out to the French fac


S . O . S .

Washington , through its various agencies , secures thematerial and ships it to France where it immediatelybecomes available for American use .

Every day an immense amount o f such material

arrives at French ports . It must be received , stored ,and allotted to the various French industri es . All this

requi res a definite organisation . It would not pay theA .B.E. to build up an institution for this work for the

simple reason that the French Governm ent throughits control o f industry and material already has such

a machine in operation . Hence all thi s material i s

turned over to the French , who store and deal i t outto thei r industries , who are paid the price fixed by the

Government . Again you have an example of theco-Operation between the French and American Governm ents which is both constructive and economical .

As a result o f this activi ty the emergency needs ofthe A .E .P. are met and many thousands O f tons o f

precious cargo space are saved for necessiti es that can

only be manu factured in the United States . This i sparticularly true o f so-called hollow-ware . A con

tainer o f any kind as a finished article occupies a con

side rable amount O f room on a ship . When that arti

cle is sent to France in the form o f a sheet of i ron itoccupies much less .The extent to which tonnage saving has been carried is almost amusing . Let me i llustrate with thecase O f macaroni . The hole in a single stick o f maca

roni i s a very trivial thing,but when you consider

twenty or thirty millions o f pounds it i s not to be

despised. Hence we ship flour in bulk from America

BUSINESS MANAGING WAR 323

and make the macaroni in France . It i s good to re

member that in tonnage as in everything else, the sum

of the small things counts .NO phase o f our Purchasing System in France is

more S ignificant than that which deals with the pro

curem ent o f machine tools and for which there i s a

special Machine Tool Section . Primarily thi s has been

a War of Machinery. When you have studied its

economic phases as I have had the privi lege o f doing

for the past four years,you reali se the value o f a

lathe or an automatic . In the early days these ma

chine tools were almost worth thei r weight in gold .

Some of the great American war fortunes were made

in them , first because the Allies had to have machineryfor shell production

,and second because we ourselves

went into the munitions business on a large scal e and

the market was combed out .

America had been so prodigal with the sale andgeneral consumption o f her machine tool s that when

we actually got into the war and needed machinery for

our various Services in France we were hard put to

secure them . At that time army purchasing was inthe first throes of organ i sation for General Dawes

had just taken command o f procurement . In orderto expedite his work in speciali sed lines an Aux i liaryAdvisory Committee composed of leading American

business men in Pari s was formed . It was o f immense aid in securing much-needed machinery

,includ

ing machine tools which were di stributed among

the Repai r establi shments in France . Out of thi s

purely volunteer organi sati on grew the Central Board

324 S . O . S .

and the Machine Tool Section of the General Pur

chasing Board . In October, 19 18 , however, the purchase O f all machine tools and small tools was transferred to the Ordnance Service, of which the Machine

Tool Section is now a part .Behind this army acquisition o f machinery i s the

larger fact that every machine tool u sed for war and

which stands up under the strai n o f incessant wear

and tear,will be an equally important factor with

peace when the world will enter upon an unprece

dented era of industrial competition . The more machinery we acquire now

,especially in France where

we will be compelled to establish industries to hold our

own in the great commercial game, the better prepared

we will be for the titanic after-the-war trade struggle .Our army purchasing abroad is not without its ele

ment o f sti rring interest . S O unromantic a need as

a freight car has taxed ingenuity and aff orded an example o f Yankee enterprise that fits into the greatstory of American war supply achievement . Although

we have a succession o f car shops in France there i salways an immense demand for freight cars . A largecar-building concern in a neutral European country

had a contract with a French Railway for a thousandcars . The bodies had be en built but the contract t e

mained unfilled for the reason,

that between the timethe agreement was made and the time of deliveryapproached

,the price o f steel advanced tremendously.

The Company wished to increase the contract price

and the French Railway declined to meet it . As soon

as the General Purchasing Agent learned of this sit


S . O . S .

an intangible thing, which is power. I t had to be acquired in precisely the same way as guns or trucks .Fully to comprehend the extent o f thi s problefh

you must understand that the A .E .F. i s engaged inan immense industrial activity in France. We have

enormous car and locomotive erection and repai r

shops ; we build tanks ; reconstruct motor transport ;salvage endless equipment ; occupy hospitals almost

without number ; operate docks ; roast and grind eof

fee and manufacture chocolate . All thi s requi res

power and every Service clamours for i t. How do we

get it !

Instinctively you would say : Why not Obtain i t

from the French ! ” This i s easier said than done for

the reason that war industry made an enormous demand upon the French electric power supply

,while

extensive expansion has been greatly retarded by the

scarcity o f men , due to the cal ling up of millions of

men to the colours . Our wheels had to be kept tu rning. The provision of power became a vital matter

and its procurement was put up to the General Pur

chasing Agent who , like our Old friend G4 — the ArmyCo-ordinator— i s the repository of requests .The General Purchasing Agent met the emergency

by establishing what is known as a Technical Board ,one of the many activities under hi s supervision . The

executive head o f thi s Board i s Lieutenant-ColonelFranci s E . Drake, who as Chie f o f the Control Eu

reau is the Chairman o f the Technical Board . The

active head , however, i s the Chie f Engineer , Major

Dugald C . Jackson, a wide ly-known Consulting En


gineer with much experience in public uti l ities inAmerica and who was a member o f the faculty o f

the Boston Institute o f Technology . Associated withhim from the start has been Captain Albert B . Cude

bec,a specialist in hydro-electri c construction and who,

with Major Jackson,was one of the pioneers in Amer

ican army power production in France . Gradually

they have assembled a group o f more than forty engineers who in civi l l i fe bui lt dams and irrigation projects and installed power plants from the Atlantic to

the Pacific . The Technical Board i s a sort o f Con

gress o f Experts who,in the face o f almost innu

m erable Obstacles , have furnished the“juice” to drive

the army ’s many-sided industries .Since it was extremely difficult to get complete new

power plants from America the Board set about to deve lop and adapt existing French power establishments

to the American needs . Wherever an uncompleted

French power station was discovered American con

struction gangs were put to work to complete it . Everypossible makeshi ft was employed all to the end that

power be secured . The General Purchasing Agentlearned that some Swiss turbines intended for Russiahad not been shipped . They were immediately se

cured and installed by American Engineers in a Frenchpower station . Our purchasing representatives scouredall Europe for installations . A complete plant was

discovered in Portugal . In less than Sixty days it wasdriving machinery up in the Advance Section .

The technical knowledge required for all thi s adjusting and adapting frequently had to be supple

S . O . S .

m ented by tact o f the highest order, for the reason thatthese undertakings involved rival French commercial

interests who were j ealous o f thei r prerogatives and

who had to be reconci led to the larger obligation that

both France and America were being served by this

expansion . With power,as with rail roads and docks,

thi s dynamic Americanisation is helping to change the

face of the country. Small communiti es that lackedpublic utilities are now enjoying the heating and light

ing advantages o f large cities .

The Technical Board i s on the j ob day and night

and i t has met emergencies with a degree of swi ft

ness not surpassed on the firing line . Here i s a con

crete story which will Show the kind of propositions

that are put up to i t . On Septembe r I7th, last , Major

Jackson received the following telegram from G4 at

Tours : “Get kilowatt plant in Europe .” It wasintended for immediate and urgent use at a large

Base port that we are using. ! ou get some hint of

the extent o f thi s order when I tell you that thi s plant

was of sufficient power to provide electric serv ice fora city of the size of Roanoke , Virginia , or Haverhill ,Massachusetts . Within a week a plant had been lo

cated in England and in a month it was installed in

France . The Supply Cities have had no monopolyon army wonder-working.

A huge map that hangs in Major Jackson’ s office

at the Elysee Palace Hotel gives a comprehensive ideaof the Empire of Power that we have helped to de

velop in France. We use powe r in exactly three hundred and twenty-eight localities . Each one of these


X IV — The Balance S heet

F al l our army buying in France had been done in

a definite and orderly manner through forward

requi rements and under circumstances which perm itted the drawing up o f stable contracts the

‘

task of

economic demobili sation would be comparatively easy.

Un fortunately, this has not been the case . Millionso f dollars’ worth of food and supplies had to be

bought in the early days under the stress o f emergencywhich knows neither haggling nor inspection . We

had to have the stuff ; the French and Briti sh saw that

we got i t, and the matter O f reckoning was le ft to thethen dim and distant date when

,with victory assured ,

inventories could be made .

We were not long in France before we real ised thatthe American Business o f War, l ike the American Business Of Peace

,required a good lawyer. We did what

any corporation would do and installed a Bureau of

Contracts and Adjustments which added another andhighly useful section to the constantly widening or

ganisat ion of the General Purchasing Agent . Oncemore the army took toll o f a big business brain be

cause Franklin W . M . Cutcheon , a prominent Wall

S treetl

attorney, who had specialised in financial law

for years, le ft hi s d esk in New York to take charge o fwhat was nothing more nor less than the Legal De

330

THE BALANCE SHEET 33 1

partment o f the Ameri can Expeditionary Force . He

was commissioned a Captain , but his conspicuous i f

unspectacular serv ice in disentangling the almost end

less kinks in our fiscal relations with our Allies has

raised him to a Lieutenant-Colonelcy . The net result isthat Colonel Cutcheon occupies very much the same

relation to the army abroad that Elihu Root bore to

the American Tobacco Company and Francis Lynde

Stetson to the United States Steel Corporati on . In

other words , he keeps the army out o f legal morasses

and helps in no sm al l way to pave the way to an

orderly adjustment o f our international relations when

the war i s over.

When Colonel Cutcheon took hold in Janua ry , 19 18,he faced a well-nigh staggering proposition . It was

no man’ s fault but the fault O f the great god War.

Practically all the first purchasing of the A .E.F. was

done in haste. The contracts were verbal and there

fore indefinite . The French Government had met

the situation prom ptly by allowing us to get supplies

at cost . Hence in many instances there was no fixed

price . Britain displayed the same generosity. When

the bi lls began to come in there was naturally no way

to check up . First of all,there was a lack of data

about deliveries . In those first days we did not have

enough Officers to go round and Sergeants had to act

as Quartermaster Lieutenants and receive goods.

Many o f them have been Shi fted ; some have bee n

killed ; others have gone home . We had to begin to

straighten out our financial affai rs and the job be

S . O . S .

came part of the work of the Bureau of Contracts and

Adjustments.The first attack was launched against the mountain

o f unpaid bills , involving many millions of francs andcovering i tems that ranged from gasolene to guns.

The Board did what any Court would do in the case

of a promissory note . I f evidence was lacking it became a matter o f good faith . Wherever receipts for

delivery were unavai lable the word o f the French Gov

ernm ent was taken . The financial decks were cleared

and an era of economic admini stration began . Hence

forth every voucher for purchases had to have the

receipt o f delivery attached,a French or British cer

tification which , with the United States Government

check, concluded the transaction .

Every army contract of importance must have the

approval of the Bureau of Contracts and Adjustments. This work , however, does not end when the

contract i s signed or even executed as thi s incidentwill show. A French butcher made a contract at a

Base port to furnish the American Expeditionary

Force with pounds of fresh beef every day.

After he had begun to carry out the terms of the con

tract the p rice o f meat went up . When he submi ttedhis firSt bills he increased his price accordingly, al

though it was not the contract price. The Command

ing General Of the district approved of the transac

tion, but the Disbursing Officer declined to pay, con

tending that the stri ct letter of the contract had to befulfi lled . The matter was re ferred to the Bureau of

Contracts,which

,after a careful investigation , de


S . O . S .

not know how to appraise and charge,so a capita

tion” rate of a certain sum per head per day for eachAmerican soldier was agreed on .

The work of the Bureau of Contracts and Adjustments will continue long a fter the last Americandoughboy has waved farewell to the shores o f France .On it will depend some o f the harmony o f our wholefuture relations with the Allies . This observation

brings us to sti ll another wing in the organisation o f

the General Purchasing Agent which i s engaged in

a task no less vital to our permanent friendship with

the great peoples with whom we have fought and bled .

I mean the Board o f Accounts which was a natural

development o f the stream of fiscal item s that literally poured into the office .The reason for the existence of a Board of Ac

counts requi res no diagram . With eleven Serv ices

buying supplies every day ; with almost continuousfinancial transactions with All ies and neutrals involving hal f a dozen diff erent kinds o f money ; and finally

the necessity for a prompt winding-up of all these relations as soon as possible a fter peace

,the need of

fiscal centralisation and standardisation i s obvious .

The Bureau o f Accounts , there fore , i s charged withrendering a consolidated account of all A .E.F. ex

penditure . This means that it must mobilise , classi fyand itemise al l vouchers and make up a Master Account for the War Department at Washington . It i s

a control and record bureau rather than an Operatinginstitution . Its work is to create a machinery that willmake the path to economic army demobilisation easy.

THE BALANCE SHEET 335

Such a work requi res the most highly special iseddirection . It was found in the person o f Major C . H .

Holloway,who in civil l i fe was a member o f one

O f the largest expert accountant firms in New York .

With him as junior officers are men with similar ex

p erience who have been invaluable assets in this all

important labour which , with the end o f the war inSight, is just beginning .

In analysing thi s work you again face the many

complications arising out o f our advent in France in

unexpected numbers and the emergency commercial

relations that had to be established with our Allies .In war every step is costly either in human li fe or in

money. In times o f great stress when the newspapers

are fi lled with the accounts o f great advances and the

conduct o f the confl ict i s a matter o f every-day necessity the cost is seldom reckoned . But when the smokeo f battle clears and peace is on every tongue the words“Settle up” have a far different meaning. The “over

head” on glory must be reckoned coldly and in cash .

The A .B.E. went to France prepared to pay for whati t got and the Board o f Accounts i s making it possi

ble to find out what i t owes , and will owe when theend has come .Why didn’ t the army pay as it went ! ” you may

ask. Simply for the reason , as I have pointed out

earlier in this article,that emergency knows neither

haggling nor orderly transaction . The payment foractual purchases made in the normal course o f war

event i s a simple piste of h ook-keeping. But when

you come to appraise, for instance, the value o f a

336 S . O. S .

forest and the basi s on which it i s to be restored after

the war, i t becomes a matter o f pure speculation .

Here i s another case . An emergency arose throughwhich the A .E .F. required many thousands of French

horses . These beasts had to be acqui red through aswi ft census o f the farms o f France. There was no

time for dickering. Big guns had to be moved ; we

got the horses, and the bill wi l l be rendered later.Still another instance o f thi s inevitable financial

hangover” arises out of our j oint occupation with

the French or Briti sh of various sectors in France .Our units have been thrown temporari ly into vari ous

districts where they purchased supplie s and incurred

other fiscal obligations. Almost be fore there couldbe an orderly process of accounting they were shi fted

elsewhere. Adjudication had to wait for serenerfl

times.This i s why an immense amount of unpaid obligation con fronts us with the cessati on of hosti l iti es. Inaddition to the instances I have already specified itapplies to the use of the French railways, the lease o f

locomotives from the Belgian Government, the re

habi li tation and occupation o f plants, quarri es andhOSpitals, and the undetermined debts in neutral countries . S o much f or our debit .On the other hand we have establi shed a considera

ble credit for we have provided our Allies with quantiti es of suppl ies that they were unable to obtain themselves

,more espe cially food, fuel and metal stores.

Frequently these“

supplie s have been issued in the field

and were recorded on scraps of pape r or anything that


money, or the lack of it, i s the usual root of mostev i l .

Thi s standardisation of accounts wi ll perform sti llanother vi tal serv ice for peace. It will enable thevarious Governments to know their war obligationsin advance o f that great day when the armies comemarching home . This means that they can arrange

for additional loans and taxes and help to adjust thetangle of foreign exchange which

,unless anticipated

,

may be one of the economic sore spots in the epochof world rehabili tation .

The subject of money natural ly leads to the Financial Requisition Officer— Captain Raymond Ives— who

i s the custodian of the strong-box of the A .E .P. Hisoffice i s one of the smallest in the Elysee Palace Hotel ,yet the army can do no business without him becausehe holds the purse strings. The Disbursing Officer o f

each Serv ice— in the main they pay their own bills

i ssues checks against deposits in the branches of theAmerican Trust Companies that are the accrediteddeposi tories in Pari s . Every afternoon each o f these

Companies renders Captain Ives a total o f all thearmy checks drawn on i t the day before. He in turngives them a check on the Bank of France to coverthe amount . Uncle Sam maintains a generous creditin thi s great national financial insti tution .

In this daily check-up you find the application o f arule in ope ration in every well-conducted corporation .

It means that the army has no idle and inert moneylying around loose in the French banks , as was the

case before our system became organised . Instead,


our funds are liquid and at work . I f you want to getsome idea of what war costs I have only to add thatthe di sbursing requirements for the A .E.F. for October, November and December are exactly185 francs, or

The average reader need scarcely be told that allthi s ram ified buying, which must go on long after thearmistice i s Signed , and which involves hundreds ofmillions of dollars and many thousands of articles ofevery-day use , must have a background of vital statisti cs. Sir Eri c Geddes, First Lord of the British Admiralty, and a Master Doer, once told me that the

secret of success, in the Business o f War or in the

Business of Peace , was summed up in the sentence“S tatistise everything.

” The General Purchasing Agent

does thi s very thing. Hence the Statistical Board i s

an essential instrument o f co ordination of war workwhich , as you will presently di scover, is performing adefinite service for peace. It was built up by Major

J . C. Roop , now at other work, and i s in charge ofMajor Joseph Willard Krueger, who has auditedconstruction accounts all the way from the Philippinesto the M alay States, and who was on the Board ofValuation o f the Inter-State Commerce Commissionwhen he cast off mu ft i for the army khaki .His main job i s to classi fy and compile the consol

idated l i sts of quarterly forecasts of the army pur

chases. It involves an examination o f every orderfor commoditi es and materials authorised by theA .E .F. He gets the S imilar forecasts of the British

and French armies in France “for the purpose of

compari son , standardisation and control . In simple

every-day language thi s means that he must preventduplication as far as possible . To achieve this de

sirable and economica l end he.

has, with the co-operation of Lieutenant Donald des Granges

,a Boston

architect in civi l l i fe,instituted a work that wi l l make

a definite and perm anent contribution to the stabil i

sation o f international trade . It reveals a picturesque

condition develop ed by the war .

Every Service in every Allied army uses nearly

every known kind of tool , especially in its Supply domain . Each Serv ice

,however, has a different name

for the same article . A sk an Englishman for a mon

key-wrench and he thinks you are talking about nat

ural history ; speak O f a frog, which i s a portion o f arailroad switch

,to a Frenchman and he at once as

sumes that you mean one of his favourite articles o f

food . When you see a bunch of inter-all ied army or

ders you are apt to find eight or nine different titlesfor the same thing. Let me i llustrate with a commonsaw. In making requisitions the Air Service calls it

a hand cross— cut saw ; the Engineers know i t as a

cross-cut saw ; Motor Transport knows it as a handsaw ; Construction and Forestry orders it as a wood

saw ; while the S alvagei

S ervice indicates i t as a car

penter saw. It makes for con fusion .

The Statistical Bureau i s making a giant card index

or a Vocabulary as it will be finally known , thatstandardises the name o f every article that armies

wil l use . The specific item of saws that I have just

used shows the urgent need o f it . In the Vocabulary


S . O . S .

between inter-allied forces . At the Headquarters ofthe Services of Supply, for example , there i s a so

called French Mission which represents the authorityof the French army. All negotiations with the French

must be made through that Mission . Attached to

every Service , large or small , i s a French Liaison Offi

cer. When any matter ari ses that requires French

intervention or co-Operation it is re ferred to him first .

In the Elysee Palace Hotel i s a considerable French

Mission which acts as the intermediary in al l mattersof purchase and which stamps the final French ap

proval on all American orders for goods bought inour Sister Republic.Sum up the work of the fi scal activ i ties that flour

i sh under the banner o f the General Purchasing Agent

and you find that they write a consolidated insurancepolicy against po st-war investigations and scandals.

Long and costly experience has shown that it i s not

war itsel f that digs the graves of reputations but theofficial inquiries that come afterwards. When pe acefinally broods John Jones of Oshkosh or anywhere

in the United States who bought a Liberty Bond may,and probably will

,demand to know how his money

was spent in France . Thanks to a standardised ac

counting system and a recorded “ follow-up”of sup

plies to the point of consumption he wil l be told tothe last dollar. The balance sheet of the AmericanExpeditionary Force will be as clean as the consciencesof the gallant men who regi stered thei r heroism on the

fie ld of battle .It only remains to speak of the significant co


ordinating agencies that supplement the BusinessManaging of War and rear the unbroken bulwark of

Allied Supply. Chie f among them in many respects

is the Military Board o f Allied Supply which is wholly

American in conception .

After the momentous deci sion was made for military unification of the Allied front under the su

preme command o f Marshal Foch , General Pershing

made the proposition to the Allied Governments last

April that i t was absolutely essential to match thiswith a military unification o f the rear. He made a

general request for an immediate consideration of them atter. He appointed General Dawes, then a Colonel ,to represent the while M . Clemenceau named

M . Loucheur, the French Minister of Armament , to

consult and suggest a plan . They jointly dev ised a

scheme for co-ordination which was discussed at twocon ferences . M . Clemenceau presided at one of them .

The result of these international con ferences wasto demonstrate again the enormous difficulty so often

encountered throughout the enti re war of securingagreement between large bodies . In hi s great desi reto secure military unification of the rear GeneralPershing authorised General Dawes to state to theinter-allied conferences that i f i t could not be accom

plished otherwise he would relinquish the commandof hi s own rear in favour o f either a Frenchman or an

Englishman under a plan of consolidated authori ty.

Finally , realising the necessity for quick decision , General Pershing, without waiting for a conclusion of theinter-allied con fe rences, submitted a plan to M . Clem

344 S . O. S .

enceau which they j ointly signed . He then sent General Dawes to England to se e Lloyd George and Vis

count Milner, the British Secretary o f State for War,to secure the acquiescence o f the Engli sh Government.A fter General Dawes’ s explanation of the plan theEnglish Government, through Viscount Milner, formally accepted it .

The plan , as finally adopted ,provided for the co

ordination O f the rear of the three armies by meansof a Military Board consi sting o f one Officer from

each army. The President of thi s Board i s Colonel

Charles Payot, who has be en in command of the rear

of the French Army for the last three years, and is

considered one of the ablest officers 1n the allied armiesMajor General Reginald Ford represents the British

Army and General Dawes by nomination Of GeneralPershing represents the American Expeditionary

Force. The Italian Army in France i s repre sented by

General Merrone and the Belgian Army by Major

The complete record o f the formation and accom

plishm ents of the Military Board Of . Allied Supply

or, as the French term it , the Comité Interallié desRavitail lements

,will afford one o f the most illum i

nating studies o f both the difficultie s and the enormous advantages of alli ed co-ordination and will sheda new light upon th e strong character and broad

vi sion of the American Commander-in-Chie f.

The Military Board of Alli ed Supply only rep reh

sents one angle o f the extraordinary team-work be

tween the Allied Governments which brought Ger


S . O . S .

own, they ’

subordinated individualism to the biggeri ssue of de feating Germany. What was said in thebeginning O f thi s chapter may now be repeated and

emphasi sed at the close . In thi s unity of eff ort inthe front and the rear l ies the real reason for democracy

’

s triumph .

How long thi s team-work will obtain a fter peace

no man can tell . The struggle to live , both with theindiv idual and the nation , will be come a fierce battle

for existence. It will be a case of the surv ival of the

fittest. Whatever happens,one thing is certain . The

lessons of co-ordination learned in the travai l of waremergency wil l have thei r constructive eff ect longhereafter.

History will give the American fighting men a highplace in the Valhalla o f the Great War. Because o f

the unexpected end o f the struggle they did not havethe opportunity to show thei r mettle ln larger numbers

and in a wider field , however arden t their hope . Theircomrades o f the rear have been more fortunate .

Thei r task began the moment the American flag was

un furled on the Soi l o f Freedom , and they were able

to record a complete achievement in force that willendure with the gal lantries o f Chateau-Thierry andSaint Mihiel .There i s glory in Supply as well as in Combat .

THE END


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LD 21 — l o0m

Documents

S. O. S - · PDF fileWe thrilled at the narrative of Chateau-Thierry and St. Mihiel, yet every twenty-four hours Since we have had an army o f any size in France these legions